The Sunshine State
by Lexiimakay16
Summary: Toni 'Sunshine' Spena, was not ready to start a new life in Florida, and she doesn't plan to do it. Her Step-mom is abusive, her Dad left, and her Sandlot gang and boyfriend are now thousands of miles away. She plans on going back but before she can she has to turn 18, and a lot can happen in a few months. Sequel to "Sunshine In The Valley" Benny/OC
1. Chapter 1

SUNSHINE POV

"Glad to see you've stopped crying." Clara said from the drivers seat, "Your wails were getting annoying."

"Well I'm sorry my misery is pissing you off." I snapped at her. She had spoken so much as four words since we started the drive, which were _Shut up you idiot._

We had finally passed the Florida state border and felt sick to my stomach as we drove deeper and deeper into this stupid state.

Clara had stopped several times for coffee and once to sleep in a motel, surprisingly enough she wasn't complaining in the slightest about having to drive all the way there.

"Why Florida?" I asked, she ignored me. "Clara I have a right to at least know why you moved me thousands of fucking miles away instead of an hour."

"If you want to know something then I suggest you change your approach to receiving them."

That pissed me of, I slammed my feet on the floor and leaned forward from my spot in the back resting my arm on her seat. "Why are you trying to mother me still? Change your approach, watch your language, you don't give a shit about me and I don't care about you. The sooner you realize that the only form of communication we are going to have is either none at all, or arguing the sooner we can just get on with our lives and stop pretending that we're not miserable around each other. Answer my damn question." I saw her grip tighten on the steering wheel knowing she was as angry as I was.

"Fine. I have some family that live there, and that school you applied to is in Florida."

"I never accepted."

"Your father did for you, if you get a job you might be able to afford the tuition before the year starts."

"I'm not going to school."

"It's your choice." She sighed. "But if you're not in school or working then you are not living under my roof."

"Then why the fuck didn't you leave me in the valley!" I screamed at her.

Clara turned to look at me briefly, the look of anger was written all over her face.

"Its a figure of speech. I thought you'd want to, get you out of the house more." I slumped back in my seat again crossing my arms. We didn't say anything else to one another the whole ride.

When we pulled into the driveway of a small white house I thought that we were in the wrong place. There were two men and a woman sitting on the porch.

Clara turned off the car and jumped from her seat in excitement, running to the porch.

I myself slowly emerged from the car and watched her hug each person in pure bliss.

"This must be Toni!" The woman cried, she looked older but definitely kept herself together really well. She rushed down the porch steps and I had to fight the urge to run the other way. "I'm your grandma!" She exclaimed crushing me in a hug.

"My what?"

"And that's your grandpa, and your uncle James." She pointed to the two men standing on the porch smiling at me.

"Well don't just stand there." My grandpa said. "Come give me a hug.' But I didn't move, I didn't know that Clara actually had family I thought she had just been placed on this earth by satan.

"Oh look at that she's shy."

My step-grandpa had bright white hair and a clean shaven face, he wore a buttoned up bus plaid shirt and brown pants hiked too far up his belly. Where as my step- grandma's hair was a box coloured blond with a few greys and a nice red and pink floral dress, she had a lot of wrinkles that showed she liked to smile and laugh a lot.

My uncle however didn't look anything like Clara, his hair was dark, he was tall and lean wearing a T shirt and jeans, he looked a lot younger than Clara as well, maybe in his late twenties, he stuck out standing next to them, like he didn't belong.

"Toni just has some manner issues." Clara told them.

"Well come on in and see the house, the movers should be here soon, would you like to see your room? We painted it already for you?" My Grandma asked, I only shrugged and followed her into the house.

It was a small house, but I looked bigger with nothing inside it, upstairs was my room a room about the same size as the one in the Valley and thankfully it was painted a soft blue colour. My grandparents had already taken the liberty of putting up a couple family photos, none of which I was in.

"Do you like it?"

"It's fine." I told her, she muttered something about the kitchen and took off down the stairs. I walked around the room looking at the different pictures, I found one of my dad and Clara on their wedding day, I took the liberty of taking that one down.

"I take it your not too happy about moving here?" My uncle James said from the doorway.

"No." He nodded.

"I also take it that you're not too thrilled about moving here with Clara?" I looked at him. "She mentioned you were difficult to parent." He explained, again I said nothing. "You know I don't really get along with her either, never did, ever since we were kids all we did was fight and argue."

"I heard that's what siblings do." I said, it was certainly what Timmy and Tommy did.

"Oh." He said looking out into the hall then back at me. "We're not siblings, no I was a, I was a foster kid, Elena and George were my foster parents since I was six. I never got adopted." I felt kinda bad about that.

"Sorry to hear that."

He shrugged. "Not so bad, they treated me like a son." there was a moment of silence before he continued. "So, Clara mentioned that you went through a baseball phase."

"Wasn't a phase." I said quickly.

"Really? You any good?" This time I shrugged. "Look I understand why you're angry, but Elena and George and actually pretty good people if you give them a chance."

I didn't want to give them a chance, I wanted to be back in the valley playing baseball with my friends and kissing Benny goodnight and eating in the diner and going swimming. I didn't want grandparents, and an uncle and to be in a state I knew no one. I hated the situation and I was not going to make the best of it, I was not going to be happy until I was back in the Valley with Benny.

James seemed to sense my unhappiness so he started to leave the room but I did have one question for him.

"Hey." I called out. "Are there any ball diamonds around here?"

BENNY POV

My parents had been going crazy since they found out that Toni had moved, they had wanted to call child protective services, a decision I had to talk them out of twice in two days.

My heart was aching not being around her, and none of us had been able to do anything productive since she left.

The most I had been able to do was get out of my bed and down to the living room.

I was waiting for the damn phone to ring since the her car left, and I was starting to lose my mind, and my thoughts were starting to wander. What if she was in a car crash? What if Clara had

lied and didn't take her to Florida but somewhere much farther, or maybe she was going to bring her to a foster home or something. What if Toni never called me? What if she didn't want to see me anymore?

Just as my thoughts were drifting, the phone began to ring, it had barely made a noise when I picked it up.

"Toni?"

"Hey Benny." My pulse started racing at the sound of her voice.

"Are you okay? Are you in Florida?"

"Yeah, I am." She sounded tired. "Turns out Clara has family here. . . . Her parents are a lot to take in but her brother seems to be nice enough."

"Her parents? You mean they're there?"

"Well they don't live with us, they live about a half hour away but they came to help us unpack and stuff."

I gripped the phone tightly in my hands as we spoke. "Oh. . . . How's Florida?"

"Benny please don't try and make this sound like some kind of vacation this is hell."

"I know."

"I've only been here a day but so far I haven't seen a single kid outside, I didn't see a park the whole drive and to top it all off apparently the closest, and only baseball diamond in town is two blocks away and owned by some team. I'm gonna be surrounded by Phillips if I go there."

"Doesn't sound too good."

"And I don't have you guys." I wanted to break down crying again when she said that, but with a few deep breaths I managed to hold it together. "How are the guys?'

"They're heart broken, Yeah yeah has been trying to convince his dad to come get you with the squad car and I don't think Smalls has stopped crying yet."

There was a pause. "And you?"

"I miss you Toni." I told her wholeheartedly, there was a sound on the other end that I took as her sniffling. "I'm gonna get you back."

"I know, I know. For now though it sucks. Ah shit."

"What?"

"Clara is back, I have to go." My heart sank into my stomach when she said that.

"Okay."

"I love you Benny, I'll talk to you tomorrow."

"I love you too." The phone clicked off, in anger I slammed it back down on the receiver and headed straight to my room.

Walking in I kicked my desk chair sending it falling to the floor, the clothes sitting atop of it went sprawling across the floor.

This was what it was gonna be? A few lousy minutes talking with her everyday, and that was considering I was going to get to talk to her every day. It was unfair, unfair to everyone but especially to her.

Toni had been living a shitty ass life her whole life and she came here, met us and everything was okay. Clara's abusive, her dad is negligent, then took off on her, and we were the only thing going good for her, and then it's just all taken away.

I was annoyed with everyone telling me "She's only in another state", but to me she might as well been on another planet. This is where her life is, not in Florida, not with Clara, she's supposed to be here with us, and no matter what we were going to get her back.


	2. Chapter 2

SUNSHINE POV

Making friends wasn't high up on my priorities list, what was however, was finding somewhere in town that I could go to get away from Clara.

"Sweetheart are you going to buy something?" I turned around to look at the old man standing behind the cash, he was wearing a Yankees cap and had deep set wrinkles.

"Sorry." I moved away from the wall of baseball gloves to walk towards him.

"You looking for something in particular?"

"No." I said, "I was kinda just trying to pass the time."

He smiled a confused, but kind smile at me. "I don't get many girls in here just looking to pass the time. Not alone anyways." I shrugged, picking up a baseball from the box on the class counter, my eyes caught sight of something through the glass though. It was an autographed ball, signed by Babe Ruth.

"You know everyone loves a signed baseball, you know anyones birthday thats coming up? A boyfriend or a brother or something?"

I looked up at him then back at the ball. "No one that would want a knock off."

"Excuse me?"

"The signature, it's a fake isn't it?" His eyes widened and then narrowed in anger.

"What makes you say that?"

"Cause I've seen Babe Ruth's actual signature, and he doesn't carry the curve of the E all the way under Ruth." he furrowed his brow and took the ball from under the glass and held it out to me shaking it in his hand as he spoke.

"This here is an authentic Babe Ruth signed baseball."

"I'm sure you can convince people that it is, just not me." He looked at the ball in his hands and then back at me.

"What's your name?"

"Toni."

"Where'd you get so smart about signatures?"

"I told you," I set the ball I had been holding back in its box. "I've seen his signature. We grew up knowing a man that played with Babe Ruth for a while." This made him start to laugh, and I felt my anger coming back. He thought I was lying, and it was the funniest thing in the world to him.

"I like you, you've got imagination." I ignored his comment, "You got a dad that's really into baseball?"

"No I have eight friends really into baseball, I call them my teammates." I managed to get out through my teeth.

He continued to chuckle "You're a ball player huh? Which team?"

"I just moved here, they're back in Los Angeles."

"You know I heard the Eagles were still looking for players, you might wanna give them a call. I'm sure they'd love to see you play and hear all about your friend who played with Babe Ruth." This erupted a new chorus of laughter from him, and I had had enough, I stormed out from his store doing my best to slam the door as I left.

It had been like that since I showed up in town, I had spoken to all of three people and each one didn't seem to believe me when I told them I was a baseball player, especially when I told them

my team was back in another state.

I guess it wasn't that common a thing for girls to play ball, just like it wasn't in the Valley when I first showed up.

It pissed me off, but I also wasn't in the mood to have to prove myself yet again to another town.

I was walking much faster than I needed to, not caring who was near me, and that proved itself when a girl with long blonde hair ended up shouldering me as I walked past her.

"Watch where you're going!" She hissed at me. I flipped her off and continued to walk.

Walking down the street my blood was still boiling with rage, and I managed to come across a diner, which I figured would be better than running into people all day.

It was a small diner, with a few kids hanging around the back and some moms and dads having lunch with their kids.

I sat at the counter and waited to be served on.

"Have I seen you before?"

"No." I answered quickly.

"Didn't think so. I usually know everyone around here, I'm Laurie." Despite her just trying to be nice I wasn't in the mood for being pleasant. "What's you're name?"

"Toni."

"Toni?" She leaned on her elbow and gave me a big smile. "I heard of girls named Jordan and Dakota, but never Toni." at the look of my expression she decided to quit with the small talk and witty comments and straightened up. "What can I get you?"

I hadn't even looked at the menu, but I ordered anyways. "Can I just get a coke please." She nodded and took off towards the back, even though I could see the drink machine right in front of me.

I sighed and rested my chin in my hand waiting for her to come back.

There was a TV above me and the ball game was on. Yankee's Vs. Red Sox, I wanted to fall to the floor in annoyance.

"Are all you guys Yankee fans?" I spoke a little too loud cause I caught the attention of the two boys sitting a few seats away from me.

"You ain't or something?" I was taken aback because I didn't think they had heard me, but I shrugged and replied anyways.

"Not really, I'm a Dodgers fan." The two boys scoffed and rolled their eyes. "Well why are you a Yankees fan?"

"Uh hello? Babe Ruth, Joe Dimaggio, Lou Gehrig-"

"So you like them just because they had some good players?"

"The best players, where the hell have you been?"

"I get that they have the best players, but all they do is buy their team, they don't do the work and become a good team. They just buy all the players they want and then win, they don't develop their team-"

"Dude." The second boy interrupted tapping his friend on the shoulder. "Why are you even arguing with her?"

My anger came back, he was just brushing off my opinions and knowledge on the subject because I was a girl. I stood from the counter in anger, Laurie still hadn't arrived so I headed for the door.

I hated it here, I hated their love for the Yankees, I hated the people, I hated how it looked a lot like the Valley and I hated everyones sexism. Even the women seemed to find it ridiculous that I was a ball player.

I decided that I was just going to go back to Clara's house and spend the rest of my day in my room and avoid possibly slapping someone.

Heading through the front door, I wasn't surprised to see multiple people sitting in the living room. Since we got here there had been people here non stop.

"Oh is that your daughter?" The red headed woman asked as I kicked off my shoes.

"Yes, Toni come here." Clara called to me the front door opened up into a large common space that acted as our living room and dining room, but the couches and chairs were to the back left and the dining room table was on the right near the stairs.

"I'm not her daughter." I said heading to the stairs.

"Toni!"

"What?" I demanded turning to face her just as I reached the first step. Clara stood from her seat and gestured towards a boy looking to be around my age.

"This is Curtis." I stared at the boy, he seemed embarrassed to be the centre of attention all of a sudden. "Him and his mom live down the street."

"Wonderful." I said dryly turning back to walk up the stairs but she stopped me again.

"Come sit down with us and get to know him. I was just telling Julie about all those delinquents you used to hang out with and Curtis is going to school on a scholarship-"

"Piss off Clara." I snapped, this time when I went up the stairs she didn't stop me, but she did follow.

I had made it into my room and collapsed on my bed when she came in closing the door behind her.

"Do you really want to spend your days here angry and wallowing in self pity?" She hissed. "When I bring someone into this house the least you can do is be nice to them?" I sat up on the bed and glared at her.

"The least I can do? You're acting like I owe you something! Within twenty minutes, you had me moving to a different state, leaving my entire life, including all my friends. I am not going to play along with your crazy attempt to play the victim and try to start over!" Clara was angry, she picked up a candle sitting on my desk and threw it across the room and into the wall. "Are you crazy!"

"You think I don't know what you, 'gave up' you talk about it all the damn time. You're the reason my husband left me and I should have you living on the street but I didn't do that."

"Oh am I supposed to fucking thank you for that? You're not doing me a favour Clara, you're stuck with me, and I'm stuck with you. You said it yourself, my dad is gone Clara, theres no reason for you to pretend to like me anymore, no one believes it anyways, stop trying to make it seem like we're some kind of fucking TV family." I stood from the bed then, I had hated this woman from the first meeting and her that was never going to change, she had disliked me from the moment I took out my baseball glove to show her and she had done a good job at playing house wife. Now we were moved away and she said it was about starting new, but she was still pulling all the same bullshit. "What the fuck were you trying to do down there anyways? Set me up with that boy? I love Benny Clara, you dragged me thousands of miles away and we're still together. Didn't you learn Clara?" I started to walk towards her. "Why you want to get rid of them, you don't tell them where you're going." I felt the sting before I felt the burning in my abdomen. Clara had slapped me across the face and kicked me hard with a stiletto heel in the gut, holding my face I turned my head back to look at her but she had already exited my room, if memory served correct, she was downstairs telling them that I was in a mood, and then tomorrow letting them know I had fallen down the stairs.

BENNY POV

Toni had been gone for five days.

Four days of non productivity for all of us. We were moping around, trying to keep our minds off of it and crying when we couldn't.

The whole town knew by now, everyone was talking about it and coming up with their own theories as to why she was gone, something I had to ignore or else I might punch someone.

"Well one of us is going to have to learn how to pitch." Ham said, very little emotion in his voice, no one responded.

"I miss her." Smalls sniffed, "It all happened so fast."

Grover pulled off his glove and tossed it to the side. "We all miss her."

"Hey Rodriguez." My head snapped up to see Phillips entering the sandlot. I cursed under my breath, I knew we were going to have to deal with him sooner or later but with the state we were all in there was no way we were going to get through it without throwing a punch or break down crying. No one stood, we didn't approach them and do our best to look tough and intimidate them, I didn't grab a bat and Ham didn't start yelling out insults. We all sat, slumped in our seats on the bench as him and his team came to stand in front of us.

"What?" I spat at him. He smirked slightly.

"Sunshine finally took off huh?" No one said anything. 'Had to skip town to get away from you? Ah well, we just wanted to come a challenge you guys to a game."

"Go away." Smalls said.

"Oh look, Scott Smalls actually speaks. So what do you say Rodriguez?"

"No." I said simply. "Go away Phillips."

"Ah why not? It-It can't have something to do with Sunshine being gone now can it?" I could feel my blood boiling my fists clenched in an attempt to keep my cool but it was Phillips. "Don't

tell me that a girl was the only thing making you guys half way decent. She was carrying the whole team and now that she's gone, you guys don't have any chance of beating us now."

"Phillips you need to leave." Ham said, he didn't say it in a rude way like everyone expected, he said it in an honest kind of way.

"I'm not gonna do what _you_ tell me to Porter." Ham stood, and actually approached him, arms out trying to shoo him out of the sandlot.

"I'm not kidding. You need to get out of here before something bad happens. Just shut up and walk away."

"Oh I get it, Rodriguez fucked her and then she left him, didn't perform well-" He was on the ground holding his nose that moment. My hand hurt like a bitch but it was worth it, Phillips team hesitated, looking at our team that were now all on their feet and decided not to get involved, they knew what he said was crossing a line.

"Keep your mouth shut about her Phillips." I spat at him, he pulled his hand away noticing no blood, and for some reason that gave him the green light to keep going.

"How many guys do you think she's screwing in Florida? She's a good looking girl, God knows how many of us would have had her if she wasn't with you all these years."

I jumped on him then making sure to knock his head into the ground as I did so, bringing my fist down onto his face I hit him in the eye, and then again in the mouth. Blood filled spit flew

from his mouth and hit me in my face, he took the opportunity to push himself up and roll us over a few times until he was on top.

His fist hit my left eye and I knew he had gotten a good shot in, but he didn't get another. His fist came down again but I moved my head so it crashed into the hard ground beside me, he yelled out in pain, I grasped his collar and pushed him off me, climbing on top.

I didn't waste time, my fist came down, again, and again, and again. Phillips was groaning beneath me as his head rolled to the side and his eyes half closed.

I was about to hit him again when a few pairs of hands we hauling me away from him.

"Let me go!" I screamed at them.

"Benny, you're gonna knock him unconscious." Grovers voice spoke into my ear.

"I don't give a shit!"

"Yeah well a cop will if we have to take him to a hospital." Squints kept pulling on my arm until I was fully standing in the dugout and forced to sit down. I watched as Phillips team pulled him to his feet and practically carried him out of the sandlot.

"Never say anything about her again you hear me Phillips!"

They were gone within seconds and I could hear the screech of their tires as they sped away.

Smalls pulled a cold beer from the cooler and handed it to me for my eye. "Jesus Benny, you think that was a smart idea?'

"Did you not hear what he said?"

"Yeah, but he always says shit like that. We know it ain't true." I glared at him but didn't say anything, he was right, he was always right and it pissed me off. As the adrenaline left my system

I started to realize just how bad my hand hurt, and tried to flex it but couldn't. Guess there was zero chance of batting practice for the next few days.

"Hey Benny," Ham took a seat next to me noticing I had calmed down. "Can I ask you something?"

"yeah."

"Why are you still here?"

"What?" He shrugged

"I mean, Toni has been gone four days, you miss her like crazy, you're getting into fights with people, She left so abruptly you didn't get a real goodbye. You have a truck."

I looked at him, he was hinting at the one thing that had been at the back of my mind for days, I had just let her go and that was what was tearing me up inside.

"So, Why are you still here?" I stood up, I didn't have an answer for him, I handed the beer off the Smalls and headed for the exit f the sandlot. "You going after her?" I could hear the smile in his voice.

"yeah."


	3. Chapter 3

SUNSHINE POV

A week had passed, I had spoken to Benny almost every night since then and I couldn't stand being in the house any longer. Uncle James had told me about a ball diamond a few blocks over, it was no sandlot that's for sure. It was huge, it was regulation size with bleachers and sunken dugouts, no weeds or old rusted cars in the outfield but a large shiny fence with a banner reading

"Home of the Eagles."

I had been going everyday since Clara hit me day and hitting some balls around once my stuff all showed up, I had asked Smalls to mail me my mitt and bat but I was able to make due with my old equipment.

I picked up another ball and tossed it in the air, I let out a grunt of frustration when it only hit the fence rather than clearing it.

Batting practice was much harder without the boys throwing to me, and it was even becoming a little boring.

"Hey!" A voice yelled out, I turned to see some boys standing in the opening to the field down the third base line. "What do you think you're doing?"

Ignoring them, I dropped the bat and started to pick up some of the stray balls and place them into a bucket, but they were already walking towards me. "I said what do you think you're doing." Again I ignored them, I picked up my bat and was ready to head on out of there, but it was snatched from my hands. "Hey I'm talking to you."

"I heard you."

He was a good looking guy with a tall muscular frame, green eyes and sandy blonde hair poking out from under his ball cap, the other boys looked like they had been playing ball their whole lives. To me they all kinda looked the same, whereas the sandlot came in all shapes and sizes. "Well what the hell are you doing."

"I was just hitting some balls."

He looked over the field were a few balls were splayed across the field. "This is our field." I noticed that his practice shirt had a print out of an Eagle on it and shrugged."This is our field, we pay for the rights to practice on it so you can get the hell outta here."

"Sorry I didn't know." I said.

He glared at me. "Yeah you wouldn't, look this here is a professional baseball diamond and we don't need a girl chewing up the field and mocking it by wearing. . ." He stopped looking at me feet to see that I was wearing steel cleats. He looked back at me a bit confused, I took my bat from his hands.

"I'll leave." I said, I wasn't in the mood to make any enemies with the first people I met. "But if this is such a professional diamond I should let you in on something. Baseball is supposed to be a gentlemen's sport."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" I was about to answer when another figure came entering the field.

"Hey assholes, you could have at least helped me carry the balls in." I tried to look around the boys to see who it was but I couldn't see past the mass of large bodies.

"Sorry Kenny, we were a little concerned with the person hitting balls on our field."

"Wait Kenny?" I asked using my bat I pushed the guy aside and walked around the rest of the team.

Kenny stopped in his tracks when he saw me, the bucket handles slipped from his fingers spilling them all over the third base foul territory. "Sunshine?" He broke into a grin and ran at me as fast as Benny could run. He tackled me in a hug spinning me around in circles. "I can't believe it, it's Sunshine Spena!"

He placed me on my feet and gave me another bone crushing hug.

"Kenny man, this your girl or something?" One of his teammates asked.

"What? No, no, no she's taken. . . I mean-" I he looked at me with a questioning look and I nodded. "Yeah she's taken. This is Toni 'sunshine' Spena, remember how I told you guys I used to play on a sandlot team? Well this is the best pitcher that LA has to offer."

The boys seemed confused. My assumption was that either Kenny never mentioned that I was a girl, or they just didn't believe it.

"This is the pitcher with the pitch that could set a boy back a grade?" another asked, Kenny only nodded and gave me another hug.

"Why the hell didn't you tell me you were moving to florida?"

"It was kind of a spur of the moment thing."

"Well you're here! Wait what about Benny-"

"Uh hello." The guy who had told me to leave called out. "You gonna introduce us or what?"

"Sorry yeah, Toni, this my team. We've been drafted to play for the college, its a team that the Yankees come a recruit from. These are the guys, that's Hank, Simmons, Tyler, Wesley, George, Sean, Matt, Cole K., Parker, Cole P., And that's Adam." He said finishing with the guy who had yelled at me to leave. Their expressions seemed to soften a little bit once I knew all of their names, but it was a lot of names to remember, I mean damn, they had twelve kids on the team and we were always struggling with nine.

"You wanna watch us practice?" Wesley asked, I shook my head, no I really didn't.

"You wanna practice with us?" Kenny asked getting extremely excited, his question was proceeded with some groans of disapproval. "Hey, I bet she can strike anyone of you guys out."

"pfffft." they all scoffed at this idea, Kenny was about to put me into a situation in which I was going to have to pitch to these boys but I quickly stopped him.

"I gotta go anyways, sorry I was on your field."

"Well where do you live? I'll come see you after practice is done." I wondered if Kenny had forgotten about how much I hated Clara or if he just assumed that I wasn't living with her.

"No, Uh I'll come by when your practice is over. What time?"

"In three hours guys yeah?" They nodded. "Three hours."

"Sounds good." I bid him farewell and started towards the exit, just as I hit the gate I felt someone tap me on the shoulder. It was Adam.

"I wanted to apologize."

"For what? Yelling at me or being a complete asshole?" He breathed out a nervous laugh and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Yeah I'm sorry about that. We're kind of just really protective of our field. I really am sorry for yelling at you."

"And why are you sorry? Cause I'm friends with Kenny, or that you actually are just an obnoxious prick?"

"I deserve that."

"Touch my bat again I'll kill you." I made to move out the gate again but his words stopped me.

"So we will be seeing you again then?" I looked at him, there was no hint of flirtatiousness in his eyes like Phillips always had, and there was no maliciousness in his tone that suggested he was being sarcastic. "I really am sorry for how I acted, it wasn't gentlemen like." He was attempting to lighten the mood but I wasn't having it, even if he was being a jerk, his entire team just stood there and let him treat me like that and it made me miss the guys even more. I wondered how Kenny could stand to be around them, or if Kenny had changed and would have stood there like the rest of them if I was someone else.

Despite this boys remorse there still wasn't an invitation for me to stay, and it irked me. "Yeah it wasn't."

Rolling my eyes I walked away from him, he didn't say anything else just went back to his team and continued on with their practice.

Kenny had changed a lot, he was taller leaner and sprouting some facial hair and a newly shaved head, but his smile was still as bright as ever, I was giddy with excitement to see him but I was also terrified to speak to him again. It was obvious in the letters he had wrote me that he adapted to Florida well, he had all the friends he needed out here. Six years was a long time and being friendly was easy to do in letters, and considering the boys he hung out with it was concerning that maybe he had changed his opinions on things while he was here.

No one seemed to like the idea of a girl ball player, maybe he felt the same.

Clara wasn't at the house when I finally made it back, she had taken to visiting people at their houses since the mark she left had turned into a handprint shaped bruise unlike the others she had left.

I put down the bucket of balls and my bat under my desk and jumped on my bed, I felt a little bit better knowing I was about the rekindle my friendship with Kenny but I was still a little terrified.

I heard a noise coming from my left, and nearly fell off the bed when I saw the closet door move.

I scrambled to my feet, snatching my bat back up from the floor, but the figure stepped out into view.

"Benny?" I was shocked and in awe. Benny had tripped his way out of my closet and was standing in front of me. "What the hell?" My bat forgotten, it fell to the floor with a clank, Benny stared at me and smiled.

"Hey Sunshine." My feet moved without me knowing and in three long strides I was in front of him and kissing him with all the passion I had within me.

He was real, Benny the Jet Rodriguez was in my house, in my room, in Florida.

He kissed me just as fiercely holding onto me like he was afraid I was going to slip away.

"What the hell are you doing here?" I asked pulling away, my hands travelled up his arms, and along his chest, trying to fathom that he was real.

"What ain't you happy to see me?" He teased stroking my cheek, his brow furrowed as he tilted my head to the side to make out the bruise on my left cheek, "I'll kill her."

"I'm fine, it hurts a lot less than it looks." I was telling the truth, I barely felt it. "Did you drive here?" Benny's expression softened into a smile.

"I missed you."

"I miss you too but Benny you drove down to Florida? What did your parents say?'

"Well considering I called them from Arizona to let them know, they weren't very happy."

"Well you gotta call them Benny, let them know you're okay-"

"I will okay, but can you just. . . . Kiss me or something?" So I did, I kissed him and I kissed him like it was the last time I was going to.

He was here, he was here in Florida and all to see me. The pain of having to leave him came rushing over me, and a sob escaped my lips, which just caused him to hold me tighter.

"I missed you so goddamned much." He whispered into my mouth before kissing me again.

"You're not gonna believe this." He groaned in protest when I pulled away from him again. "I'm sorry, but, Kenny's here."

"What?"

"Yeah, I just saw him a few minutes ago, I didn't even clue in that I might end up living near him." Benny's expression held both confusion and excitement, the same one I had when I saw

Kenny.

"You mean he's actually here?"

"Yeah, I can go see him in a few hours. . . . .Benny why did you come here?" He was taken aback by that. "No I just mean, did you just come here to visit?"

Benny shrugged, "All I know, is that I missed you, I didn't really think about it. I don't want to think about it either can we just be happy that we're together right now?"

I nodded, my brain was going a million different directions but my body just wanted to be held by Benny, and enjoy him being here.


	4. Chapter 4

SUNSHINE POV

"Benny the Jet Rodriguez, I can tell you I didn't think I'd be seeing your ugly mug ever again." Kenny stated as he hugged his old friend.

"Likewise, but from what Sunshine told me, you're doing pretty well out here, why would you come see some dirty sandlot players?" Kenny laughed and gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder.

"Ah, you know I'd give a leg to play with you guys again. I like being on a real competitive team but these guys have no soul, no passion, they're only here because they can afford it, I'm on a scholarship." I smiled a half relived smile at that, he was still the same ol' Kenny who worked hard for everything he had and wasn't going to get sucked into all the materialistic things in life.

"But what the hell are you guys doing out here?"

"It's a long story. Kenny." I said, he grinned and threw his arms around mine and Benny's shoulder's.

"And I got the perfect place for you to tell it, it's open all night in case we need it." We laughed and followed him down the street, apparently it was the same diner I had been to a few days ago, only this time the place was almost completely filled.

We were seated in a booth near the back and I was thankful for it, there were stares for Benny and I and high fives for Kenny as we walked to our seats. I guess he hadn't lost his loveable nature.

"So last I heard was that your dad took off, that was the last letter I got from you and I'm sorry I didn't call you or anything it's just-"

"It's fine Kenny." He sighed in relief and visibly relaxed in his seat. "It's kinda the reason I'm out here. Clara just out of the blue picked up our stuff and dragged me out here without any warning."

"No kidding?" I shook my head, Kenny glanced towards Benny. "You propose to her or something? Or you just so madly in love with her that you're crazy enough to drive all the way out here just to get your ass kicked back to California."

Benny rolled his eyes, "The second one. Look we didn't really get to say goodbye properly, and I really didn't want to wait months for her to come back without a proper few days together to accept it."

"Well little miss Sunshine, if you're gonna be here for a few months, why not just join my team for the time being?" I snorted at his offer. "What?"

"Your team doesn't seem to like me very much."

"They don't like anybody."

"Well what about your coaches?"

Kenny had picked up his spoon and was now playing with it in his hands. "We don't got one, at least not yet. We're not the final team, they're still looking for players for training, the season only starts in the spring after all. Tryouts are in the fall, we just all kinda got together and decided training would be better done together." Well that was just great, they had a lot of attitude and bravado for guys that weren't even on a team yet.

I could understand them having a little bit of an ego because they were recruited but they weren't even on the team yet.

"You told me that our scout came to one of your games yeah?" Kenny asked placing the spoon down.

Benny shifted uncomfortably. "Yeah." he replied dully. "The game we were forced to lose to save the sandlot. . . . Guess its a good thing he didn't take Phillips eh?"

"So are you on the team?" I asked Kenny, he nodded.

"I'm the only one with a guaranteed spot, not meaning to brag or anything. But everyone else either is attending the college and want to try out or were invited to come tryout. I'm the only one that they offered a spot to right away."

"Congrats." I said with a smile, he grinned and waved his hand dismissing it.

"Thanks, but it ain't that big a deal, but it sure makes those guys jealous."

Just then a pretty red headed waitress came over to our table still trying to get her name tag on. "I am really sorry guys, they just called me in, we didn't think it was gonna be this busy, and I just got here. What can I get you- Kenny?" Kenny looked like he had just swallowed the spoon he had been fiddling with.

"Hi Katie." her expression went from shock, to anger, to a smile in about three seconds. "I'm gonna have the pizza sub."

"And we're both gonna have the onion ring burger, thanks." Benny said quickly handing her the menus, he had obviously seen the look on Kenny's face and was eager to help him out of a possible awkward situation. She nodded and with a forced smile took off. "Friend of yours?"

Kenny sunk in his seat rubbing his hand over his face. "I didn't think she was gonna get called in. I knew she wasn't working today."

I leaned on the table towards him raising an eyebrow. "Care to explain?" He shook his head. "Oh come on, you know all of our business."

"Your business doesn't include some crazy and clingy girls in your life."

"Did I never mention Hailey?"

Kenny sighed, he was obviously annoyed that the girl was here and was trying to avoid her, and it was going to make him uncomfortable talking about it but I really wanted to know. Partly because I wanted to know more about Kenny, but a selfish part of me just wanted to know the gossip in town. A week in this place without having anyone to talk to, and everyone judging me, it would be nice to know a thing or two about everyone else.

"I'm living here this year, but before then I was living about an hour away and only coming here to visit the school, and see friends. Basically I met her at a party and things got a little too wild, we slept together and even dated for a few weeks."

Benny reached under the table and placed a hand on my knee, "Bad breakup?"

"I guess you could say that. . . . but I didn't mention that I kinda had a girlfriend at the time." Benny and I shared a look with one another.

"You mean you were cheating on her?"

"I never asked her to be my girlfriend, she just kind of assumed we were together and I thought we were just friends. I was an asshole and when I caught on to what she was thinking I didn't exactly set her straight. Anyways she found out and got my girlfriends number and called her. . . . it was a mess, alright? "

Sounded like it, Kenny wasn't the type I thought could ever cheat on a girl, I mean he was well aware of the way Phillips acted and hated him for it, and he always treated me and girls at school with respect.

"And this is the first time seeing her since everything blew up?" Benny guessed. He nodded and sighed again, an amused grin showed up on Benny's face and I had to smack him for it. "Ow!

Come on it's the funniest thing we've heard about since Yeah Yeah falling asleep on that girl."

That sparked Kenny's interest. "What?"

"Ignore him." I told Kenny. Just as our conversation was about to change topics Katie arrived back at our table, two cokes in her hands.

"I realized I forgot to take your drink orders." She smiled sweetly, but it wasn't as innocent as she made it seem, as her arms extended and emptied the contents of both glasses onto Kenny's head. "I hope coke is okay!" She yelled at him before stomping away. The entire diner exclaimed in either amusement or shock at her actions.

Kenny did his best to removed the sticky contents from his eyes. "I deserved it."

I agreed with him before handing him my napkin so he could clean himself up a bit.

"Do you think she's gonna bring us our food?" Benny wondered aloud, Kenny ignored him and watched Katie storm out of the diner in anger. I guess _she_ wouldn't be bringing us anything, but

we chose to stay.

"So Benny, if your girl isn't interested in joining the team, what about you?"

"What about me?" Benny was skeptical, he had me hounding his ass for years about being recruited and it tended to piss him off, now it seemed like Kenny was looking to do the same thing.

"Come out and play with us."

"I live in California."

Kenny rolled his eyes. "I don't mean forever. We have another practice tomorrow, come out and just hit some balls with us or something." Benny didn't say anything, he seemed conflicted about something, whether it was that he felt like he was betraying the sandlot by playing with another team, or he was slightly intimidated with the idea of playing with college ball players, I wasn't sure. But whatever it was he didn't seem too keen on the idea. "Benny I'm just asking you to keep your game up while you're here. You guys know what a week without practice can do to your mechanics."

"If you go, I'll go." I told Benny, he raised an eyebrow at me. "Why don't you wanna go?"

"Kind of sounds like a big team of Phillips'." Kenny burst into laughter then, and managed to agree through his amusement.

"Yeah I guess they are. Benny I'm asking more for my sake, They don't think I'm as good just because I played sandlot ball for so long, having you there would knock them down a peg or two and save me months of aggravation."

Reluctantly Benny agreed.

As much as I understood Benny not wanting to play with a bunch of stuck up jerks, I was happy he said yes. For as long as Benny had played he's been the best in town, and although he was extremely talented he had only ever played with the sandlot and against Phillips. It was gonna be one interesting day to see if Benny would actually survive the big leagues.

 **AUTHORS NOTE:**

 **Hey guys, thanks for reading, commenting and reviewing, it means a lot considering this is the second instalment and this is the part of their lives I am super excited to be writing. It's gonna be a little slow for a little bit just cause there has to be context and a build up to main events so hang in there :)**

 **I did want to say that I am thinking about writing another story. i know I tried to write a Stand by me story and I kinda abandoned it, but I got writers block. The Sunshine state, is still my number one priority but I do want to start writing another story just to keep things interesting and fresh in my life.**

 **There were a few forums/communities I was thinking about writing about, they're not the most popular on Fanfiction, but I never really was into the latest trend anyways. So I'm asking for you guys to give your input on what story you think I should write:**

 **-The Nightmare Before Christmas (This would be a adventure/ romance story, with the love interest being Shock)**

 **-BBC Robin Hood. (Again a Adventure/romance story, with the love interest being Will Scarlett.)**

 **-Gotham (not too sure if I have enough Ideas for this one, but it would be a Comedy/romance/horror story with the love interest being Jerome)**

 **-Rise of the guardians (Romance/comedy with the love interest being Jack frost)**

 **Please give me your opinions! Thank you!**


	5. Chapter 5

BENNY POV

"So what was your plan Kenny?" It was the third argument I had been in the middle of today, the first had been when I showed up at the diamond ready to practice, and they refused to have me join. The second was when I had tagged out one of the boys and they claimed they were safe, and now this one. I had just finished batting, their second pitcher had taken the mound, and he was no Kenny or Sunshine.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Kenny yelled at the black haired catcher, I wasn't used to seeing such a small person catching, he was Squints size, I really wanted to see someone try to take him down if he ever blocked the plate.

"Did you just want to embarrass us by bringing some sandlot player in and showing us all up?" I quickly dropped the bat in my hands and took off the helmet they had lent me.

"Wesley, he's a friend of mine, and I asked him to come join us. If I wanted to embarrass you I would have demanded Toni pitch to you."

"Who the hell is Toni?"

"Does being a girl make you invisible around here?" Toni's voice came from the bleachers where she had been forced to sit and watch. Despite them having met her twice now, it didn't seem to be important information for them.

Kenny had marched from where he stood in the dugout and was now peering down at Wesley. "Maybe if you guys are embarrassed it's time to start taking this a little more seriously and work on your game. However, just because Benny only plays sandlot ball it doesn't mean he has to be a shit player. I mean grow up."

"Uh." I said interrupting the two boys. "Look I didn't mean to embarrass you guys, I just thought we were having fun. I can sit out if you want."

"No!" Kenny said quickly, before turning his attention back to the catcher. "He's just mad because he can't clear the fence." When I had first arrived I thought it was going to be a lot easier to get along with these guys than it was. Sure, they didn't want me playing with them to begin with, but we didn't want Smalls or Toni to play with us when we first met them either. I just figured that proving myself in the batters box might make them open up and accept me, but they wanted me to fail, and when I didn't it pissed them off.

"All you do is shoot your mouth off about your sandlot team and how great they were."

"Yeah and Benny just proved it."

"We're your teammates, you want to embarrass us and make us hate you or something?"

I cringed when I heard Toni's voice from the bleachers. "Hey I thought you guys weren't on the team yet." Kenny's eyes widened as the boys on the field turned to look at her. He drew his hand under his chin telling her not to say anything but it was too late, they had heard her.

"What did you say?" Wesley asked her.

"Nevermind."

"Kenny told you that didn't he?" Sunshine was up and off the bleachers in a heartbeat. "Hey! If you think we're not good enough to make that team-"

"Don't yell at her." I snapped at him. "She didn't say anything that wasn't true, the only one with a guaranteed spot is Kenny, and I'm sorry if my being here made your guys insecure about your own talent but I only came cause I was invited. As far as I can see it, Kenny doesn't need you guys to like him, you need him to like you. Cause if he's got a spot on the team the coaches ain't gonna pick the kids that don't get along with him." I dropped the helmet to the ground. "Thanks for the invite Kenny, but I think I'm just gonna spend some time with Toni."

Kenny nodded, giving a sympathetic look before glaring at Wesley and taking off towards the bench.

Toni was waiting at the gate for me arms crossed.

"What a bunch of L-7 Weenies." I said taking her hand in mine. "If that's what this league is like I'm glad I ain't apart of it."

"Yeah they're all a bunch of jerks. They're all out for themselves, you notice no one came to defend Kenny or the catcher?" She brushed some hair out of her eyes and back under the cap. "I hope that pitcher isn't in the starting roster. He could even strike Smalls out."

"Hey that's not nice." I laughed nudging her shoulder with mine. "But yeah if that's the best they have other than Kenny then they are in for a rude awakening."

"Worst part of it is, that was Adam." I looked at her eyebrows raised.

" _That's_ the kid that was screaming at you to get off the field? Jeez, the kids got one hell of an ego to suck that much, and be that much of a dick." She agreed with me, and the two of us took off towards Clara's house, Toni had assured me the night before that Clara wouldn't be home but I didn't want to take the chance and ended up sleeping in my car.

"When do you think you're gonna head back?"

"My parents were pretty mad when I called them, but they said I could stay until the end of the week."

"Three days?" I nodded, she was disappointed, so was I. I don't know what I was expecting when I came down here to see her. At the time I thought I could just bring her back with me and

everything would be okay, but it's not that simple.

I was just going to have to suck it up for a few months and come get her on her birthday.

"I'm sorry you have to fend for yourself in this town." She shrugged. I was more sorry for the fact she would have to deal with Clara by herself. As it seemed right now, she wasn't home very often and that made it seem a little better.

"I'm sorry you guys don't have a pitcher for the summer."

"We'll figure something out." I teased. When we made it to the house Clara's car was gone again.

Sunshine opened the front door, "Are you hungry?" she asked but stopped in the doorway when she saw the living room. "Benny run."

"What?" I looked past her to see that Clara was in fact home, and sitting in the living room was the witch herself and two police officers.

"Get outta here." Toni said pushing on my chest to shove me out the door.

"I knew it!" Clara's voice screeched out. "I knew he was here! Don't just stand there, arrest him!" The officers moved lazily from the couch and started to walk towards us. It was only then that I clued into what was happening and I took off running down the street, far too terrified to look back.

SUNSHINE POV

The cops moved a little quicker when they saw Benny take off, but I blocked their path holding my arms out to stop both of them from crossing the threshold of the front door.

"Miss you need to move."

"No!" I yelled at them, the first officer's hands wrapped around my arm in an attempt to move me. The second officer had slipped through the gap he had made and went outside "Don't you dare touch me, or you're gonna have to explain to your chief why you put your hands on a young girl!"

"Excuse me?" I glanced at Clara then back at the officer.

"Ow why did you hit me?!" I demanded. His eyes widened in shock and confusion. I pulled my arm out of his grip and raised my hand to the still fresh looking handprint on my face. "Why did you hit me officer? I moved out of the way didn't I?!"

The second officer apparently had heard what I said because he came back into the house to investigate. "You hit her?"

"No I didn't hit her!" He looked at his partner then back to me, the bruise obviously hadn't formed that quickly, but with the time it would take to drive and file a complaint with the police station, that was more than enough time.

"Miss, lying about an officer becoming physical-"

"You can't say I'm lying. You weren't here to witness it." His glare turned into a look of utter bewilderment.

"Alright." He sighed trying to calm the situation. "The kid is probably long gone by now, I couldn't even see him when I got outside. Ma'am was that the boy you were referring to?"

Clara nodded. "Yes officer that's him."

The officer pulled out a notepad and began to write something on it. "Okay. We'll take a look around town for him and let you know if we find him-"

"Wait." I snapped catching the attention of everyone in the room again. "What the hell is going on?"

"Sweetheart, I need to ask you. Is that boy the one who gave you the bruise on your face?" I opened and closed my mouth a few times not knowing what to say. I looked at Clara who seemed pretty pleased with herself, she called the cops on Benny but for what?

"Of course he didn't!"

"Then who did, I know it wasn't my partner, now if you tell us the truth I promise things will be easier."

"Easier for who?" I demanded, his calm tone was pissing me off. "What the hell did she tell you?"

The officer shut the door, and led me to the couch where they took a seat but I stay ed standing.

"Your mother has contacted us with deep concern that the boy, uh Benjamin Rodriguez." He said reading off his note pad. "Has crossed state line, broke into the home, and has been harassing your family for quite some time. Including becoming psychologically abusive towards you." I looked at Clara eyes wide. "She claims that because of his presence you have become emotionally unstable, and that you have been lying and running away. Is that true?"

"No!" I yelled at them "Benny isn't abusive, he crossed state line to come see me because he missed me."

"There is an attempted forced entry on the back door, as well as a window frame that was popped out of place." So that's how he got into the house to hide in my closet. "Your mother also states-"

"She is lying!" I screamed pointing at Clara. The officers seemed physically annoyed with the situation, like they just wanted to leave and end their shift for the day.

"Your mom-"

"Stop calling her my mother! She's not my mom, she's a goddamned inconvenience until I turn eighteen!"

"I'm going to have to ask you to calm down." The officers had stood now and were now watching me like a hawk to make sure I didn't make any violent movements. But I wasn't a violent or unstable person I was just angry.

"Oh fuck you with your _calm down_ bullshit, I lost my keys and broke into the house yesterday." I lied. "This hand shaped bruise is from some bitch I pissed off at a store." I lied again. "And

Benny has not ever been abusive or hurtful towards me. He came here to see me and I welcomed him with open arms because we have been together since we were twelve years old and I love him." I said honestly.

The room fell silent at my words, Clara arms crossed looked between the officers and me, she was waiting to see what they would say.

The officer who had grabbed my arm let out a frustrated sigh. "Alright then. Ma'am I'm sorry but theres obviously no proof that he broke into the home, and if she's telling the truth then theres no reason to arrest the young man. There isn't really any reason for us not to believe her. We're going to ask around, we'll look for the boy and if we find him we'll bring all of you in for questioning to get to the bottom of what's going on but if he's gone over the state line again then theres not much we can do. California state police would get to this case within a year at the latest. If he's gone and doesn't come back then it looks like your situation is solved, but if he does just have him come down to the station or give us another call alright?"

Clara's fake smile I thought she had only reserved for my dad became present on her face. "Yes, thank you officer."

A few more questions were asked, some more things were written down and with a call on their radio the two officers were gone.

I was the one to close the door behind them, with my forehead leaning against the door I waited to hear their car pull out of the driveway and take off down the street.

I turned on Clara then, fists clenched. "You called the fucking cops on him? Are you insane?!"

"He forced himself into my home. I saw his disgusting truck on my drive home yesterday."

"Okay. But please tell me about all the times that he's abused me and damaged me psychologically. You can't have him arrested on false accusations Clara I won't let you."

Clara stalked towards me finger pointed. "This is my home. And I couldn't stop you from seeing him back in the Valley but I sure as hell will not let that mixed race mongrel into my home.

You can tell him that if I ever see his face near you or this home I will have him arrested." She stopped in front of me, eyes level and just a few inches from my face. Clara had always been shorter than me but the heels she wore made her my height.

"If you ever call him that again, I will rip out your eyes and ram them down your throat, then I'll break your knee caps and listen to what kind of sound you make."

I pulled the door open then. The temptation to go to the police and tell them about Clara was great, but it wasn't an option. I filed about a abusive parent I would be put into foster care and there was no way I was going to let that happen.

I needed to find Benny and tell him what was going on, I prayed that the cops hadn't found him first.

 **AUTHORS NOTE: He guys my poll for another story is still going on, I listed the story ideas in the previous chapter so let me know what you think/ would like to red and thanks to those who have already voiced an opinion!**

 **Have a great weekend guys!**


	6. Chapter 6

SUNSHINE POV

Benny had been gone for hours, and the sun was now setting. I barely knew the town anyways and I had gotten lost twice while looking for him, I had gone to the ball diamond asking if they had seen him run by but that only got me some very dry and rude comments back.

I assumed that Benny hadn't been found, his car which was parked on another street had been moved and a large part of me was sure that he had taken off.

I was glad, the police seemed uninterested in the case, but that didn't mean they weren't going to look for him, Benny needed to leave Florida.

Clara's car wasn't in the driveway but she was actually gone when I had gotten home, where she went I was unsure but I didn't really care.

For a fleeting moment I panicked and thought she had gone to the police station because they had found Benny but I quickly forgot about it when I saw Benny sitting on the couch in my living room.

"Jesus Benny." I sighed hugging him tightly. "I thought you left, or they might have found you."

"Nah, I just drove out of town for a few hours."

I hugged him tightly once more, the daylights had been scared out of me when I saw those police officers and I hadn't actually believed he was okay until he was in my arms. I pulled away holding him at arms length and sighed. "You have to go."

Pain was evident in his eyes but he nodded. "I know." His hand brushed my hair behind my ear in a tender gesture. "I just can't believe I have to leave you again."

"I wish I could go with you."

He kissed me then, this kiss was filled with grief and. . . .Lust. He was demanding, he was strong and powerful, claiming my lips as his and only his again and again.

Hands strong on my back he held me flush to his strong hard body, his hands travelled up my sides ghosting over the sides of my breasts and up to my neck.

At length he pulled away, a shaky breath leaving his lips, the wrapped around me picking me up so my legs wrapped around his waist, carrying me up to the bedroom. There was a raw need in

his eyes, but there was also a question in there as well.

His hand reached down to mine, interlocking our fingers together he let his thoughts pour all over his face.

Biting my lip I nodded, and Benny kissed me again, his arms pulled me up wrapping my legs around his waist, as he carried me to the bedroom.

We laid together, a tangled mess of sheets and limbs. It had been painful and messy and uncoordinated, but it had been passionate, perfect and I had to admit, a lot of fun.

"My mom always told me to wait till marriage. . . I don't really remember why." Benny teased admiring our hands locked together. I laughed and shifted to fully face him.

"I love you."

"I love you too." He whispered kissing me softly. "I _really_ don't want to have to leave now."

"Was this the perfect scenario you were picturing in your head?" Benny smiled and shook his head.

"No, but I'm not complaining."

"Me neither."

In way everything had changed, Benny and I had always been together in our hearts and souls, but now we were connected with our bodies. I felt an even stronger connection with him that I didn't feel was even possible.

However, at the same time nothing had changed, he was still Benny, I was still Toni and we were still in a pretty messed up situation. Benny was going to go home and I was going to stay here until my birthday and then we would be together.

"Are you okay?" I hadn't noticed that I had been staring at the ceiling for probably a few minutes.

I looked at his far too handsome face and forced a smile, "Yeah, just thinking."

"About?" He pressed, propping up on one elbow.

"Just how different things are going to be when I get back, you know?"

"Nothing's gonna change."

"The sandlot team will be all but gone, I think you, myself and Ham might be the only ones sticking around."

"They'll come back, and in the meantime we can still play ball, at least you'll be home." I smiled at him and nodded, I just wish it wasn't going to take so long. Benny played with my fingers,

his mind was obviously as distant as mine was and he was just as broken up about the situation as I was. "I should probably go."

"No." He laughed at my childish tone and pulled me into a kiss.

"I hope you don't think I'm fucking and running." He teased kissing my nose. "But I don't want Clara to come home and find me."

"I know." And I really did understand why he had to go, I just really didn't want him to. With one more kiss he was up and attempting to get dressed.

There was no denying how hot Benny was, part of me almost felt bad for not allowing the girls to even have a chance with Benny. We met when we were just becoming interested in girls and boys and we had been together since. I never had eyes for another boy, and the only other boy I had kissed was Phillips but that was always against my will.

Benny never seemed to care for other girls either, something that baffled me, there were many girls interested in him and made it blatantly obvious at school. The reason it baffled me was because I could have very easily became his friend rather than his girlfriend, at the age of twelve it was surprising that he didn't like more girly girls like Yeah yeah.

I watched him dress, hard muscles working to put on his clothing and I blushed thinking about how those muscles had worked on me.

I swung myself off the bed and began to dress myself, my legs wobbled and I had to grasp my desk for balance.

"Whoa, I didn't hurt you did I?" Benny asked coming up behind me.

I shook my head laughing. "No Benny, I know I told you it hurt at first but I'm fine. You didn't hurt me, quite the opposite actually."

That stupid sly grin popped up on his face again. "I healed you?"

"Shut up you know what I meant." Ignoring the bra I slid my shirt on quickly along with my jeans. I felt Benny's arms wrap around me from behind.

"I love you. I don't want to go."

"I know." I turned in his arms to give him a quick kiss, I glanced at the clock on the wall and eyes widened and quickly pulled away from him. "Is that the time?"

It was eight o'clock, Clara was MIA these days but she always came home around this time of night. "You gotta go, now."

"Okay." He nodded but his face showed that it was the last thing on earth he wanted to do. We walked together to his truck down the street, he hopped into the truck the window rolled down he looked at me. "I really wish you were coming with me."

"I do to, say hi to the guys for me." I told him.

"You can do it yourself, believe me they're all dying to talk to you. Though I do think, that they think I'm coming back with you."

It broke my heart, leaving Benny was hard but it was just as hard to leave all seven of my best friends behind. "I love you Benny. See you soon?"

"I love you too." His lips captured mine in another kiss.

It wasn't as hard this time, we had the chance to say goodbye, and there was a promise made that we were going to be together again. Knowing that could get me through until my birthday but

it still wasn't an easy goodbye.

Something felt different this time when we parted, we weren't broken, we were untied, we were a lot stronger than Clara or this messed up situation.

But I still couldn't believe that I was watching him fade into the distance for the second time.

 **Authors Note: I apologize sincerely if this wasn't the heated and passionate moment that you were expecting. But there's a reason for that, with the future events to come the fact that their first time felt almost casual will bring more dimension to the story. I promos that there are more heated moments to come, but you need to remember that I wrote Benny and Sunshine's relationship over the course of 5 years for a reason. I wanted them to be connected emotionally before they were together physically.**

 **I hope you enjoyed the chapter, things are gonna get dramatic soon. Happy reading!**


	7. Chapter 7

SUNSHINE POV

It had been three days since Benny had returned back home, he called to tell me that he was safe and I even got to speak to the boys for a few minutes before I had to hang up the phone. Phone bills were a concern of ours, I knew that if it went too high then I was going to be in serious trouble, and I never saw Clara use the phone so she knew it would have been me.

I was in my room, sitting at my desk and attempting to restring and tighten up my baseball glove when Clara knocked on my door.

"You knocked?" I asked as the door opened, she didn't enter but the door was fully opened.

"My family is coming over for dinner tonight."

"Is that all you wanted to tell me?" Clara wasn't a cook, so I wondered what on earth would be served, or if she was just going to be offering up take out and playing it off as what she had made.

"You're joining us."

"I politely decline."

I could visibly see her cussing me out in her head. "It's not a suggestion or a request Toni."

"Why do you even want me there?" I asked placing my glove down. "What good can possibly come from me sitting down with your family?"

"Well believe it or not my parents want to get to know their granddaughter."

"Don't you have to be my mom, in order for me to be their granddaughter."

"You are my daughter."

"By law, and by marriage. But I don't consider that a parent, I don't even consider my dad a real father, so again. I politely decline." Her hand darted out grasping my baseball glove and throwing it to the ground. "Oh that was mature."

"Can you for once in your life not be difficult?!"

"I'm trying to just ignore you and tolerate living together until I'm eighteen. You said yourself I'm outta here the second my birthday comes so why are you so keen me having a relationship with your parents?"

She had enough, her hand clasped the door handle and pulled it behind her as she exited. "You'll be down at the dinner table at 6 o'clock."

The door slammed behind her.

I rolled my eyes and picked up my ball glove off the floor. Dinner wasn't the worst thing in the world, her family was nice enough, I just didn't want to have to sit there and pretend that everything was okay because it wasn't.

I was sick and tired of people thinking that Clara and I didn't get along because I'm a moody teenager that resents her for not being my real mother.

I wanted out of this place and this town, it wasn't like I was twelve anymore and making friends came easily, I was seventeen and I couldn't just walk onto a ball diamond and show up a bunch of boys and have them respect me. Everyone here seemed to have their friends, and weren't in the market for any new ones, a friend might make it a little harder to leave here but it would also make it a little easier.

I had Kenny, but he was playing baseball everyday until school started and it was a little hard to make plans with him when all I really wanted to do was play ball with someone.

Six O'clock came too quickly, and I was stuck sitting at the table across from my grandma and next to my grandfather.

"It smells great." My grandma, who I had taken to calling Elena, said. "I didn't know you could cook." She didn't, just was boiling a bunch of water to give the illusion, I would know, I had to

reduce the heat because the steam set off the fire alarm, and saw her refill the pots twice. Clara only smiled at her mother placing a another pan of food on the table.

"So Toni, tell us more about yourself, we want to know everything." My Grandpa George said.

"Everything?" I asked raising an eyebrow.

"Well, start by telling us when you start college."

I looked towards Clara, who stared right back, urging me to lie. "I'm not going to school."

"I thought you got accepted."

"Accepted doesn't mean I'm going." I couldn't help the rude tone to my voice, I did feel kinda bad but it felt as if, if I accepted them as my family then I was accepting Clara. And it wasn't as

if they just wanted to get to know me and be their friend. they wanted me to be their granddaughter and be apart of their family, it was the last thing I wanted.

Elena looked at her husband then back to me."Well, you're going to college though right?"

I shook my head. "Nope."

"Toni, you have to go to college."

"Why?" They were taken aback by my boldness, as if what I was saying was the most absurd thing they had ever heard.

"Toni you can't get a good job without a college degree."

I rolled my eyes at that, it was clear that they were a white and privileged family, hell I was white and privileged just had a shitty ass dad and Clara. Even though the world had changed and it wasn't the 1900's anymore, there was still racism and social class. No one even batted an eye when Benny mentioned he wasn't going to go to college, he was going to have a great job working with his Dad. The double standard was evident when you looked at me and you looked at Smalls. Both white, both privileged and both with the money to go to school. People lost their minds when Smalls said he wasn't too happy about University, but Smalls was brilliant, I was as dumb as a post, I was only average, where as Smalls is expected to go to school because he can actually make something of himself because he's a "smart kid" I was just expected to go to college.

"You can get a good job without a college degree. I know plenty of people with great livings without going to college." My anger was rising as the conversation went on but Clara quickly stopped me before I went off on her parents.

"Maybe a subject change would be best. We're still discussing her enrolment." Clara lied so easily to her own parents it disgusted me.

We ate in silence for what felt like hours but it was only about eleven minutes, enough time for my Uncle James to refill his plate.

"So." George started. "I'm so sorry to hear about what happened." When the table was silent I looked up from my plate to see that his comment was directed towards me.

"What?"

"That, that boy you moved to get away from came into the home and just- ugh when I even think about it I get upset." I turned my head to look at Clara who was continuing to eat, though there was an obvious drain of colour from her face. Obviously George had said something that he wasn't supposed to.

"Excuse me?"

"To think you had to call the police to get that boy to leave you alone! No humanity in the youth today I tell you, he puts you through that kind of mental torture and-"

"Dad!" James snapped cutting him off. "I don't think this is a subject for the dinner table. It's none of our business anyways."

"Of course its our business! That Mexican. . . hispanic. . . whatever he is-"

"Dad!" James yelled again, this time George looked offended.

I placed my fork down as gently as I could, and turned in my seat to face him. "Benny. His name is Benny. And for your information, _Grandpa,_ what he is, is Mexican, Latino and _American,_

Not that your ignorant mind would be able to see that he was born in America and is every bit as American as you are. Also he doesn't just happen to be his race, he's also an extremely talented baseball player, an amazing friend, a kind hearted gentleman, a little bit of a dork, and an incredible boyfriend."

"Toni I didn't-"

"And if you really want to get to know me then here it is. My mom, my BIRTH mother died on a street after being shot, my dad remarried to this witch, you happen to call your daughter. She's manipulative and abusive she has verbally abused me, and hit me on multiple occasions. Because of that when we moved to the valley I made friends with nine boys on a baseball diamond, by the end of the summer I was dating Benny and we're still together. I spent years lying, hiding and pretending that I wasn't playing baseball everyday. The cops were called multiple times because of the yelling that came from the house. My dad was negligent and never even noticed what was going on with me, he barely even spoke to me for years, and then once everything came to light, t was publicly proven how much he doesn't care when he didn't show up for my high school graduation. A few weeks later we find out that he disappeared for reasons unknown and then Clara moved me out here away from my home, my friends, and my boyfriend." There was a silence in the room and my voice echoed through the house, I was so sure that the neighbours could hear. "That's what you need to know about me, not what my favourite colour is, or why I don't want to go to college, or what I do on the weekends for fun. I am not apart of this goddamned family, my ball team and Benny are my family, I don't need you ignorant, small, and racist assholes! So do what I have been asking for since this _she_ entered my life, stay the heck out of it, and leave me the hell alone!"

It was childish, I knew that, but it didn't stop me from pushing back my chair and storming out the front door with my name being called after me.

 **BENNY POV**

I don't know what would have been worse, telling the guys or not telling the guys. It was bursting inside me to tell someone, and I did, I just kinda wish I hadn't now.

"No offence Benny, but we kinda all thought you already were having sex." Squints admitted as we walked down the street. Another practice had been cut short out of frustration for no one being able to pitch fast or hard enough, or not having any other pitches than a fast and a change up. Half of us couldn't even get it in the strike zone. Lob ball and soft toss had become out number one outlet for batting practice.

"Yeah yeah, you guys have been together forever!"

"But I never told you guys about it."

Ham shrugged. "Yeah but you know, its Toni. . . .ew." That wasn't the reaction I had gotten when I had told them at the sandlot, in excitement they all tackled me to the ground and started yelling at the tops of their lungs "Benny the non-virgin Rodriguez." and now they were taking me out to dinner to celebrate.

"I miss her." Smalls said quietly from behind us.

Grover gave him a sympathetic look, Bertram always considered Toni his best friend on the team, I mean we were all best friends its just he really felt a connection with her over the years.

"We all do Smalls. Casanova here was supposed to bring her back!"

Ignoring them, and the trying to forget the long lecture I had gotten from the boys when she wasn't with me this morning at the Sandlot.

We sat down in the diner, Squints ordered for me, a deluxe meat pizza with extra sausage. . . he has a way too dirty mind.

Ham didn't even look up from his menu as he spoke. "I still can't believe she called the police on you. Crazy old bat."

"I don't even think she's forty Ham." Timmy told him but he only shrugged.

"Old is old."

We ate, the typical conversations coming to surface, and we talked like best friends would, but there was the missing commentary of our best friend Sunshine Spena.

Everything was off without her, practices, conversations, meals, everything.

Walking home definitely didn't feel the same, it was just me and Smalls having our detailed conversations about the day.

"Are you okay?" Smalls asked as I stared at Toni's empty house.

"yeah why?"

"You haven't really been . . . On your game." I wasn't too sure what he was talking about, and he seemed extremely reluctant to elaborate.

"What are you talking about?" I prompted.

He looked around trying to delay what he was going to say and I wished he would just spit it out. "You haven't-" He took a deep breath. "You haven't hit the ball over the fence since you got

back Benny."

I raised an eyebrow. "We don't have a decent pitcher."

"Benny it's lob toss."

"The harder the baseball comes at you the harder and farther it's going to travel."

Smalls rolled his eyes at me. "Okay, how about Timmy Yeah yeah tagging you out today, Benny? You NEVER get out."

"Everyone gets out Smalls." I snapped, I wasn't sure what point he was trying to make but it was pissing me off, everyone has bad days at the diamond and just because I hadn't hit the ball over the fence didn't mean anything.

"It's not just that Benny. You over ran fly balls, bobbled grounders, threw to the wrong base-"

"Smalls! _What. Is. Your. Point?"_ I demanded.

Again he sighed running a hand through his thin blonde hair. "Somethings going on with you Benny."

"I missed a couple days of practice-"

"Oh shut up with your excuse, you don't forget how to play in a few days Benny. Now you told me when you came back that you were okay with Sunshine staying there, now I believed me when you told me and anyone else would with the way you carry yourself. However, I have seen you on the diamond Benny and you are not yourself."

I threw my hands up in the air in frustration, he was being ridiculous, I was fine, Sunshine was gonna come back, we had had sex and we were stronger together than ever, and him saying that

I lost my game was pissing me off. "The point Smalls, get to the point!"

"You're not the same when she's gone. You're a lot more upset with the situation then you're admitting and its proving in your game. You gotta sit down and talk about it with us Benny and I don't mean mentioning that you miss her when we bring it up I mean actually talk about it."

"We've talked about it Smalls."

"It's brought up every two minutes and the most you say about it is agreeing when we say we miss her and saying 'she'll come back'"

I stared at my best friend in anger. "Sunshine, being gone has nothing to do with my game, because my game is fine." Sensing my anger Smalls held up his hands in defence.

"Alright, if you say so Benny." he was being condescending and for a second I missed the awkward and shy little dork he used to be and hated how much more confident he had became.

I shook my head, completely fed up with the conversation. "I'll see you tomorrow." He waved and we went our separate ways as I crossed the street to my house.

Toni didn't have anything to do with how well I played baseball, I was good before I met her and I was good afterwards. I was upset she was gone and she definitely had an impact on practices but my performance had nothing to do with her being gone.

Sunshine had a lot of impacts on my life, but she did not have an impact on my baseball abilities.


	8. Chapter 8

SUNSHINE POV

I awoke to the sound of someone pounding on the door, it had been another week since my outburst at dinner, I hadn't seen much of any body since then and it was starting to take a toll on me.

I had taken to sleeping until 1 every afternoon, it was difficult without Benny waking me up every morning for a practice to go to.

I threw myself out of bed and pulled the door open. "What?!" I demanded only to see my Uncle James standing there, he didn't say anything just pushed past me and into the house. "Uh, come in?" He walked straight to the kitchen pulling out some bread and putting it into the toaster.

"Get dressed." He told me.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Get dressed." He repeated, I rubbed my eyes attempting to wake up and try to understand what he was doing.

"What you don't have food at your house?"

He turned to look at me, peanut butter in one hand and a glass in the other. "Your not sleeping all day, get dressed we're going somewhere."

"I'm not going anywhere with you." Clara had informed me that not only had I embarrassed her at dinner, but the conversation continued with them dismissing everything I had said, I hadn't expected to see any of them any time soon.

"Get dressed!" he snapped. Rolling my eyes I stomped up the stairs and pulled on some jeans and a t-shirt, he obviously wasn't going to leave without me and if he was taking me on a drive to dump me somewhere I guess it wouldn't be that terrible a situation.

When I came back down the stairs, he placed the toast with peanut butter on the table and pointed to it. "Eat."

"I haven't had an adult make me breakfast since I was seven."

"EAT!" He snapped, I did as instructed, I even finished the ridiculous amount of milk he had poured for me. I was just a little surprised that we even had milk in the house, I had never seen Clara grocery shop.

Once I was finished I pushed the plate away and slammed down the glass a little harder than intended. "Now what?"

"Come on." He walked to the front of the house and out the door, leaving it wide open for me to follow. I did follow but what the hell was he doing?

He was already in the car when I walked out, a nice looking red dodge, it was shining in the sun and looked as if it had never left the garage other than the mud on the tires. I got into the passengers seat and didn't bother saying anything to him, I was itching to ask where the hell we were going but I kept quiet.

The drive was only a few minutes, twenty at the most and it was a lot of random streets to get to our destination, turned out it was the college.

"No." I said as he pulled into the parking lot, "No way. I'm not enrolling in school."

He ignored me and undid his seatbelt opening the car door. "Get out of the car Toni."

"You can't make me go to school!" I said not moving an inch from my seat.

"Get out of the car." He slammed the door closed, and started to walk around the rear towards the school. In anger I pushed the door open and exited the car.

"Are you deaf or just stupid?" I yelled at, when he didn't turn around I slammed the car door and stomped after him. "I'm not enrolling here you can't make me! Take me home!" I was creating a scene for the few kids and their parents in the parking lot, but I didn't care. "For fuck sakes!" I snapped, I ran up to my uncle and grabbed him by the shoulder forcing him to stop.

"Take me home!"

"Oh shut up!" He yelled back at me, I was shocked that he had yelled at me, it was something that I hadn't been expecting. "You don't have to enrol, but I promised my foster parents that I would take you here to at least see the school."

"Why?"

"Because it's the only way to keep them from turning you over to some kind of delinquent class so you can 'become a proper young lady'"

"I went. It's called cotillion."

He rolled his eyes at me. "You lied straight to their faces Toni, you told them a pretty screwed up story and they didn't like it. You have to at least show that you're thinking about college or they're going to attempt to send you to some kind of military style school."

I stared at James, he didn't believe me, they didn't believe me, no one believed the truth and they all believed Clara's lies. Back in the Valley everyone knew the truth, but here Clara had them all wrapped around her finger. "I didn't fucking lie!"

He sighed hands slapping against his thighs in annoyance. "Toni, I'm trying to help you. I don't want to see you sent away."

"They can't send me away-"

"Yes they can." He interrupted. "And if you actually plan on leaving when you're eighteen you're going to have to be in Clara's care, not some school, they can make you stay until you complete a program which with your attitude, and physical skill level could take years." It was unfair, it was completely unfair, I told the truth and now they wanted to screw me over for it. I was vibrating with anger, but I managed to stay calm long enough to avert the attention of the onlookers. "Are you going to come in or what?"

I didn't say anything, just pushed past him and towards the school doors with the large sign that read OPEN HOUSE.

I didn't really fit in, I kind of stuck out, for some reason all the kids were dressed up, not suit and tie, but hair brushed and nice shirt and pants. I was in my grass stained jeans and an old T-shirt, my hair was still in the ponytail I had slept in and I was wearing my PF flyers from three years ago.

"So what course did you apply to again?" I hadn't noticed that James had followed me inside.

"Fuck off." I muttered loud enough for him to hear, I walked on into the halls of the school, James didn't follow me thankfully. There were booths set up everywhere, and it was almost impossible for me to squeeze my way through the cluster of students surrounding them.

"Hey there!" A voice called out. I kept walking but then it came again "Hello? Hi!" I turned to see a very blonde girl with a high pony tail and a clipboard smiling far too wide at me.

"What?" I asked.

"You look like you're super sporty." Oh jesus. Although I may have looked like a sports person, she did not. She reminded me of Wendy, very pretty with red lipstick and perky air about her, but her happiness didn't seem genuine like Wendy's was, she seemed annoyed to be there and was one rude student away from snapping the clipboard in half. "Would you be interested in playing some team sports this year? It's a great way to stay healthy and be apart of a group and make new friends." Despite the fact that I wasn't really listening to her, I approached the table anyways. There was a stack of the lists of sports the school offered, I scanned over it not finding the only sport I was looking for. "Are you an athlete?" She asked.

"Uh, I think your list is wrong, the baseball team isn't on here." I told her holding the sheet up so she could see.

"Oh no." She said her smile never wavering. "You see this is the girls sign up for sports. The boys is down there." She pointed with the clipboard down the hall but with the crowd of students I couldn't see where she meant. "We have softball though."

I put the paper down and went in search of the booth that she was talking about receiving a not so nice, 'nice talking to you' from her.

I didn't find the booth that she was talking about, I assumed it was the booth that was surrounded by teenage boys hollering and cheering but I strayed away from it. The next hallway I turned down happened to be a lot emptier. I could read the banners now and it seemed I was in the hallways for more sports.

The one with the baseball on it caught my eye, and I approached it.

"Hi." There was another volunteer behind the table, a male, that seemed a little more relaxed about being there. I gave him a nod and looked around the table for a registry form but didn't find one, there were a bunch of booklets with a baseball player on the front though. "Can I help you with something?"

"Is this where you sign up for the baseball team?" He gave me a funny look.

"Uh, this is where you register to try out for the team, yes."

"All the other booths have sign ups-" He stopped me then.

"Oh, the other hallway is like the fun part of it. You know on Thursday nights where you can drink beer and forget what the score was at the end of the night? This is the registry for the teams, students looking to play competitive baseball for the school and compete in tournaments and for scholarships."

"That makes more sense." I said and he laughed a little bit. "So how does this work?"

"Well we have scouts that have done recruiting and have either given spots to players or have offered for players to come and try out for the team. We can take as many players as we need, last year they took twenty."

"Twenty?" He laughed again.

"You have to have a starting roster, and then a second string for each position and you know only some players can pitch-"

"No I get it. . . it's just thats alot."

"Yeah. So anyways there are some kids that don't have the scout come so we offer the opportunity here to sign up to tryout." I nodded picking up on of the booklets.

"Do you have a brother or something play ball?" I looked up at the green eyed and blond haired boy.

"No. I'm a baseball player." He seemed surprised, just like everyone else was. "When are tryouts."

He held up his hands to stop me before I said anything else ridiculous. "Hold on. The team is Varsity, meaning any age can come and tryout, but it's Varsity _boys._ We don't allow girls on the team."

"Why not?"

"Well, if we did then the entire rules would have to be changed, they would demand that we accept a certain number of girls and then there would be issues if we didn't take any. It's just how it is."

I rolled my eyes at him, "I asked you when tryouts were."

"If you show up to the tryouts, they won't let you on the field, even if they did they wouldn't take you." He was being as calm as possible and as reasonable as possible, but it still aggravated me.

"Hey Spena!" Kenny's cheerful voice came from down the hallway, taking my attention away from the boy at the table.

"Hey Kenny." I had to force a smile at him. "I didn't really think I was going to see you around anytime soon."

"Whys that?" I shrugged, not really wanting to tell him that I thought he was going to be too busy to hang with me. "Oh, so did Benny really get chased out of town, cause I have to tell you that is badass-"

"Shhh shut up!" I snapped covering his big fat mouth with my hand which he pushed off.

"Hey I want you to meet someone."

"It's not another teammate is it?" I asked, he only laughed and shook his head leading me down the halls again. "Hey coach."

"Oh god." I muttered ready to run the other way, it wasn't because of his coach, it was because he was standing next to the scout that had come to our game a few weeks ago.

"This is Toni Spena, Toni this is Coach O'Niall." I shook his hand. "Coach this is one of my childhood friends, and the best pitcher out of the Valley."

"Hi." I smiled.

"Well nice to meet you Toni." He didn't ask me anything about playing baseball, figured he must have thought Kenny was exaggerating. "You planning on going to school here in the fall?"

"Ah well, no not really." He raised an eyebrow at me.

"Whatcha doing here then?" I didn't know what to say, I couldn't tell him that I was being blackmailed to show up here and look around.

"I was kinda looking for a job I guess." I lied.

"A job?" I nodded.

"Yes sir." He was an older gentlemen with salt and pepper hair and deep laugh lines creased on his face. He was taller than me but only by an inch or two and his skin was very tan from hours out in the son. I glanced at the scout, he seemed disinterested in the conversation, he hadn't even given me a second look.

"Well now, you tell me, you like baseball Toni?"

"yes."

"And you know baseball?" I nodded. "Well hows about you come work for me?"

I must have looked as shocked as was because he let out a hearty laugh.

"As a coach?"

"No no no, kind of like a equipment manager, you know make sure all the equipment is in order, and with tryouts coming up I'm going to need a smart young girl like you to keep all these

boys in line."

I stared at him, in bewilderment. "Are you seriously offering me a job?"

"Well come and help out with the tryouts, help me see things that I might not be able to, you like it you can stay on and help with the scheduling and equipment. How does that sound?" I looked at Kenny, who was beaming at me and nodding in encouragement. "Kenny had talked about you. If you don't like it you can quit."

"I uh. I don't really know what to say other than yes. Thank you." I shook his hand smiling. This could work, I would be going to the school as a worker and no one else needed to know why I was going, I would say it was some kind of school prep and at the same time I would be making some money and on the diamond.

"Alright, if you come here tomorrow I'll introduce you to the rest of the team. How's Ten o'clock sound?"

"Sounds great. Thank you." He gave me another smile and then directed the scout away to finish their conversation.

"You can thank me." Kenny said nudging my shoulder with his.

"And why would I do that?"

"I just got you free access to the ball diamond. You'll get a key to the shed and diamond, you are welcome."

I rolled my eyes at him but I was grateful, maybe this would make things a little more bearable.

 **Any ideas on what might happen next? I like to hear your predictions, sometimes I even like them better than my own Ideas LOL**


	9. Chapter 9

SUNSHINE POV

"Toni Spena, I want you to meet head Coaches, Paul Cedar and Mark Talent, and our assistant coaches, James Lainey and Sid Willock." I shook each of their hands and gave them a smile.

"I thought you were the head coach?" Coach O'Niall laughed and shook his head.

"I am, these guys do all the work and I get the final say." He punched Paul in the shoulder and he laughed along wit him. "So I think we'll get you started up with just sorting through the players profiles, sort them by position, statistics and then secondary positions." I nodded, but I hadn't expected him to hand me a stack that was four inches tall.

"All these kids are trying out for this team?"

Coach O'Niall laughed. "We've been the state champions six years in a row, the national Champions the past three and 20% of our players either make it onto the recruitment team or get recruited right away."

"Jeez." I took the forms and headed towards the long and large table that they used for team meetings. I knew Kenny had talked this team up but I hadn't expected something like this.

It looked like every male baseball player in the state wanted to be apart of this team, aside from the eight back home.

It was a gruelling task, most of the players didn't have a secondary position, and a lot of the statistics sucked, and some I was almost certain were made up. No one bats .1000 and also there was no such thing as having 12 perfect games in a 13 game season.

I supposed they would get exposed as the tryouts went on, but it was ridiculous for them to lie.

Coach Paul came into the room about two hours into my sorting. "Hows it going."

"It's going." I told him. "How do the tryouts work?"

"Well with each tryout we're hoping to cut it in half."

"There's like two hundred kids here."

"Yeah, we let everyone try out, you can't tell a ball players potential by a sheet of paper." He had a point. "That's why we have five tryouts. After the first two days we'll cut 100 kids, and then

we'll cut 20 and then another 20 then we have two exhibition tournaments to see how they play. Then we make our final cuts."

I nodded and after another hour of sorting I had finished organizing the players.

"I have another task for you." Coach O'Niall said scaring em half to death. "We have a field a few blocks from here, some of the boys have been practicing on for the past few weeks."

"I know the one."

"Alright head on down and write down a few things for us will you?"

"Like what?"

"Just things you see. Number of pitches they have, how well they're hitting. Give us an idea of who to look out for."

I nodded. I was doing grunt work but I didn't mind. It wasn't like I was getting coffee and washing their cars, I was involved.

When I got to the field the same boys were there including Kenny who was pitching, they didn't seem to notice me or really care that I was there so long as I wasn't on the field. I had a pad of paper and a pen and was ready to start writing notes but I didn't really know anyones name, so I went by what they looked like.

It was going okay, when they called for a break and one of the boys, a shorter blonde boy that kinda looked like Smalls came over. I mean he would have looked like him had this boy not been

build like a truck. I always thought Benny was fit, but this guy looked like he could lift the bleachers with 60 people on it.

"How do you throw the ball like that?" I asked, he looked up at me and raised an eyebrow. "The muscles. . . doesn't it make you lose the flexibility in your arm?" He ignored me and started rummaging through his bag for something. "Did you hear me?"

"I heard you." He snapped. "Mind your own damn business."

"Meow." I growled at him. "Chill out, I was just asking." His eyes rolled and he continued to look through his bag. A short moment later his hand came out clutching a needle. Before I could

say anything he was sticking it in his arm and injecting a clear liquid into his veins.

"Whoa what the-"

"Oh calm down. I'm diabetic." He snapped before tossing the needle into his bag and storming off to the dugout.

As he left Kenny took his place giving me a big smile and leaning one arm on the bleachers beside me. "Hiya Sunshine."

"Hey."

"You know he's lying right?"

"Huh?"

He nodded in the direction of the boy who just left. "He's not diabetic."

"Then-"

"Steroids." My eyes widened, it made perfect sense but I always thought that they were Illegal, especially in school baseball. "None of us have ratted him out or anything. Can't really prove it unless they do a urine test, which they probably won't do."

"Why not?" I asked.

"He's the best hitter we have here."

Steroids.

Something I had never seen in my baseball career so I didn't really know how to feel about them. I did know that they had some nasty side effects and that they were not allowed in the major leagues. Why was he willing to risk a possible career this early? "So what are you doing?" Kenny asked trying to see my paper.

"Oh. taking notes on you guys."

"So the black kid pitcher. . . he's the best here isn't he?" He joked that giant smile still plastered on his face.

I grinned and nodded. "Oh you know it."

 **A/N :Short I know, it was a filler, the action will be starting soon I promise!**


	10. Chapter 10

SUNSHINE POV

"I don't think I can do all this for another two months Benny." I told him over the phone, A month had passed now, and tryouts were starting tomorrow for the team but I was going a lot more grunt work than I thought I would be doing. "What started out as actually helping with the selection process has turned into a water boy job."

"At least it's a job, and you're on a ball field all day."

"Yeah raking it and carrying around buckets of baseballs, they don't even let me hit ground balls or anything." It was becoming increasingly annoying, I wasn't expecting to be a coach or anything but the fact that they seemed so impressed with me being female, and knowing how to play ball gave me hope that I would be involved. However, the coaches were just extremely old school and stuck in their ways, they were just like everyone else and didn't seem to think I had skills playing the game, just that I knew the rules. "The only good thing about it is they finally gave me a key to the diamond and equipment shed."

"So you can go out a practice? That's great."

"So long as I rake the field afterwards like I hadn't even been there."

"It's only for two more months Tone." Benny assured me, but already a month had passed and it didn't feel like time had flown by. I was stuck in the house with Clara, and the only people I knew either didn't respect me or thought I was a liar. Word had spread about what had happened to my dad and me in the Valley and like all rumours, they spread like wild fire and became very out of proportion. From some of the stories I had heard it was a shock that Coach O'Niall hadn't asked for some kind of background check on me. "Look I miss you and I love you, but I have to go into the shop today or my dad is going to lose his head." I sighed wishing we had more time to talk with one another.

"Okay, I love you too."

The receiver clicked letting me know that he had hung up the phone, and my heart sank. I was lonely here and I knew Benny missed me but he had the boys, boys who would be leaving soon for school but he had them for the time being. I was hoping that being with the coaches was going to keep me focused on something but it was only making me miss the sport even more.

It was hard to think that after this my baseball career was ending, I couldn't imagine playing with any other boys than the sandlot boys, and it was becoming evidently clear that I wouldn't have the opportunity to play with anyone else ever agin.

Two hundred, sixty three boys.

That was how many showed up to the Eagles tryouts, and about forty of those boys hadn't even filled out an application, they showed up with Daddy's money and waived it in my face as I signed them in like a bribe.

I didn't take it but apparently coach O'Niall was fine with accepting a few hundred dollar bills in exchange to send their child home after the first tryout.

"Listen up boys!" Coach O'Niall yelled out to them. "I am Head Coach O'Niall, and these are our other head coaches Paul Cedar and Mark Talent, and our assistant coaches, James Lainey and

Sid Willock. We will be evaluating you today and taking notes so don't be alarmed if you see us writing things down pointing at you. It can mean something great, or something terrible, so do your best not to be debating which one it is. That being said, even though there are only four of us and 263 of you that we don't see everything cause this here is Toni." I had been standing off to the side thinking that I wasn't going to be apart of this announcement. I awkwardly waved to the 263 heads that turned to look at the girl who had been running the sign in booth. "Toni is female as you can all see, but she will be joining you in your drills today. She will be floating from each station participating with you and then occasionally evaluating you just as we will. So be careful with what you say and do because she's gonna catch and see everything. Twenty minutes to warm up then meet back here!" He dismissed the boys and the large group took off into pairs to start throwing, taking up any space that they could.

I quickly walked over the the four men who were now deciding who was going to be where and at which time. "You didn't tell me I was going to be doing drills."

Coach Talent gave a smile and wink. "What did you think you were going to be off in the corner the entire time? Nah we're putting you to work."

"I just didn't think I was going to be actually participating." And I honestly didn't I thought I was going to be sitting at that stupid sign in booth and getting water all day.

James Lainey, who was a very large and red faced man piped up. "Well we kind of came up with the idea last night, that is if you think you can keep up with these guys?" He have a lighthearted smile but I knew that these men did not actually expect me to keep up with these boys. I felt as if their plan was to see how the boys would treat me, and the kinds of comments they would make when I screwed up. Would they be supportive or would they be rude and unsportsmanlike about it? The joke was on them though, cause now they were going to see how they reacted when a girl beat them at their own game.

"I think you should be worried about them keeping up with me." The men laughed at that and then pointed for me to go get my stuff.

"Hey." I said approaching one of the boys, he was short with reddish hair and a yankees jersey on. "A little three way?" I asked waving my glove. His face paled a little bit and then looked to his throwing partner who was now a good twenty yards away.

"Uh." He said looking back at me. "We're almost done." I took the hint, he didn't want to warm up with a girl, or maybe he didn't want to screw up in front of me, even if it was only warm up.

Either way he was not keen on having me join him, in fact none of the seven groups I asked were took keen on it.

They all had their excuses. "We're done." "We're throwing too far for warm up now." "Three way is going to be too confusing with this many people" It didn't matter.

I couldn't find Kenny in the mass hoard of people but it was fine, because by the time I had stretched out my arm anyways a bullhorn sounded calling us all back into the infield.

There were six stations.

ground balls. Field the ground ball from shortstop and throw it to first with a radar gun measuring how fats your throw was. Base running. As the fielders field ground balls there was a base runner being timed to run around the bases while avoiding the shortstop and first basemen. Fly balls. In the outfield there was three boys hitting fly balls to three lines of boys. Rest Station. Knowledge testing. At the bleachers there was a white board and a marker with Coach Lainey testing a the boys knowledge on both play strategy but as well as the rules. Dives and over the shoulder. Located on the other half of the outfield.

Pitching, catching and sliding was going to be at the end of the day.

I had decided to start with fielding, considering my outfield skills were laughable, I took my place at the front of the line, ready to field when I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"Back of the line princess, I'm number one on this team." It was Adam, the same Adam that had yelled at me on the field and then apologized for it.

"Get your hand off her Annex before I break 'em." Kenny's voice called out from the the middle of the line.

I shrugged off his large hand and turned to face him. "You wanna embarrass yourself sooner rather than later? Go right ahead."

I pushed past him to head to the back of the line, a chorus of "Oooooh's." Came from the boys behind us and it was clear that it wasn't sitting well with Adam.

"Tell me which coach did you sleep with in order to get your place in the coaching staff huh?"

"Hey watch your mouth!" This time Kenny stepped out of line and started towards him.

I stopped him quickly. "Kenny don't, you'll get kicked outta here if you start something."

It was then that the clank of the bat was heard and a baseball went flying into Adam's ankle knocking him to the ground. "What the fuck!?" He screamed grasping his foot and rolling to look

at the small redheaded boy who had hit the ball.

"They said to start, you should have been paying attention."

Angry and annoyed Adam forced himself to stand and limped his way to the back of the line to nurse his bruised ankle.

"Hey look at that, at least some people here have your back." Kenny smiled leading me to the back of a long lineup.

He was right, but two out of 200 and something wasn't the best odds, it was all the others that I was worried about.

I mean a Phillips and his team were one thing, but I don't know how I'm going to survive this many of them.

BENNY POV

"Benny-"

"Shut up and throw the ball!" I screamed at Smalls.

He looked down at the ball in his hands and sighed before dropping it on the mound and stepping off.

"Smalls throw the damn ball!" I snapped at him again.

Smalls had been helping me with batting practice every morning since Toni left, he wasn't the best pitcher but he was able to get it over the plate. "No Benny, you're killing yourself, you need

to relax or something."

I dropped the bat on the plate and glared at my friend. "Throw the fucking Ball Smalls."

"You haven't hit a single ball in days Benny, you're not just going to miraculously start hitting again."

"I'm going through a rut."

"You're going through Sunshine withdrawls."

"For the last time, her being gone has nothing to do with my game-"

"Yes it does!" Smalls yelled at me then, he had heard enough, and frankly I had heard enough from him as well. "Benny you're so upset with her being gone that you can't focus on it anymore. This is where you and Sunshine met, it's where you and her spent everyday together, it's where you and her based your entire relationship and now she's gone and now you're so depressed about it that you can't perform well!"

I had been on a decline, but I was in a rut, it was about time I had gotten into a rut.

A few years ago Sunshine couldn't throw a strike to save her life for about three days, and then there was that day when Squints couldn't hit either, and of course there was no forgetting when

Grover completely missed about twenty ground balls in a row and then broke one of our better bats.

But after a month, I was no longer hitting pathetic bobbles to the pitcher, I couldn't hit anything, and it was fine.

I was a good hitter and all the mechanics and years of practice didn't just leave my body, I was going to get back into the groove, but I wasn't going to if Smalls refused to throw the damn ball.

"Are you even listening to me?" Smalls demanded throwing down his glove, no, I wasn't.

"Are you going to pitch to me or am I going to have to ask Yeah yeah?" Frustrated Smalls threw his hands in the air and stomped his way to the dugout. "Oh, come on Smalls. Are you actually getting angry with me?"

"Yeah I am." He snapped like a four year old, he even went so far as to sit down and cross his arms, sulking.

"Why?"

"You're pissing me off."

"How?"

"Because everyone around you see's whats going on and we keep telling you but you won't listen to us. Then you get pissed off that you can't hit and we try again to tell you why and you ignore us!"

I made my way over to him. "Because Sunshine doesn't have anything to do with my ability to hit. I hit fine before I knew her, I was hitting fine when she first left-"

"Fine! Don't admit it, come here everyday for another month and miss a thousand balls and call it a rut."

"Fine I will." Now I was acting like the four year old.

"But can you at least admit it."

"Admit what?"

Smalls rolled his eyes at me. "Admit that it's not the same without her here. Admit that even though it's _not affecting your batting,_ that Sunshine not being here does effect just everything in general?"

"Well of course it does, we don't have a pitcher and-" Smalls fist slammed down on the bench so hard that the layer of dust resting on it flew into the air, and startled me.

"Stop it! Stop talking about her like she was nothing more than just our pitcher. Pitcher's are replaced Benny, I don't know if its some kind of coping mechanism with you but stop identifying her as our pitcher. She was more than that, not only is she also your girlfriend but she is our friend. She is the person that kept us all in line, the one that patched us up when we were injured and the person that yelled at Ham and Squints for sexist remarks, and was the number one person against Grover's smoking. She is apart of the sandlot and we cannot replace her, position wise, sure but person wise, no. We can't do it, and we also need to stop acting like she's still here because she isn't and it sucks. Just admit it."

Smalls was right.

I was treating the situation like we had lost a pitcher, not our best friend and it was true, it messed with everything even people's habits. We need to stop acting like Sunshine is here when she's not. Sunshine being gone is something that I am trying to ignore, something that I felt like, if I was at the sandlot it wouldn't feel like she was gone. Sunshine affected all of us in a different way and she is my girlfriend. If I pictured her as just our pitcher, it made it a little more bearable to deal with but she was more than that and it was affecting me because of it.

"Okay."

Smalls eyes pierced a hole into my skull "Say it Benny."

"It's affecting me a lot more than I'm letting on." I didn't expect the words to have so much power over me, and I knew just how broken I felt after saying them when Smalls jumped off the bench to hug me. I didn't even notice I was crying until Smalls shirt was soaked.

SUNSHINE POV

"You are doing such a super job!" I swear on my life, if this child did not get away from me I was going to punch him. His name was Michael, as he had so enthusiastically mentioned, and was now following me around the field telling me how amazing and _super,_ I was. I couldn't tell if it was genuine or not which is what made me angry, I mean the first six times he complimented me I took it in with charm, but now I was ready to tell him to fuck off.

It was a lot better than the threat I had received while walking to the dugout for a water break when a wonderful gentlemen snatched my arm and whispered. "If you get me rejected from this team, I will break your leg while you sleep."

There were plenty more colourful characters like him but the ones that were getting on my nerves the most were the ones attempting to be overly fake and friendly with me as though it would guarantee them a place on the team.

"Thanks." I muttered to him before taking a sip of my water.

"I really mean it. You don't see many girls on the baseball diamond, but you're showing up these guys here and-" It was then that the whistle had blow and Michael took off in a sprint towards the coaches.

It was like there were two sides to the tryouts, those that were happy to have me, and those that were pissed off.

Two boys had already been sent home, one for breaking his finger while fielding and the other was rumoured to have been seen stealing someones car keys.

"Hey! HEY!" someone yelled out. It was coming from the other side of the dugout, someone was yelling and waiving their arms in front of the building which contained the concession stand and bathrooms. "Hey somethings wrong with Coach O'Niall. Someone come here!"

"Boys stay put." The rest of the coaches took off towards the gate and I followed suit, they didn't tell me to stay where I was, and there was a possibility that I could help since I was almost positive I lived closer than anyone else here.

Coach O'Niall was sitting against the brick wall of the bathrooms and having a hard time keeping his eyes open, head rolled to the side and his face was bright red.

"Is he having a heart attack?' The boy demanded as he stared down at the coach.

Coach Cedar kneeled down next to him. "Hey, are you alright?" Only a mumble came from his lips. "God Damn it. Toby, go and see if the first aid kit has insulin. He's diabetic." Wide eyed and terrified Toby took off towards the dugout arms flailing as he ran and I suddenly remembered him running the bases earlier that day and making a mental note that Yeah Yeah was no longer the only boy who ran like a duck. "Hey stay awake okay?" Coach Talent was already dialling 911 to come and check up on him. "You forgot your insulin again didn't you?"

"Is he going to be okay?" I asked.

"Yeah he will, it's happened before." Toby came back something in hand.

"Here. Simmons also diabetic."

He handed the needle to Cedar who gladly took it and popped off the top of the clear tube it was in and pulled it out carefully inspecting the needle to make sure it was still usable.

"What are you waiting for? Stick it in his stomach!" Cedar waived off Toby's frantic yells and then gently started to untuck O'Niall's shirt.

It was then that something clicked within me. "Whoa wait, whose diabetic?"

"Simmons." Toby said eyes wide and glued to what was happening before him, I grasped his face in my hand forcing me to look at him. "Small kid, blonde hair?"

He nodded, my hand still holding his chin. "Built like a tank. Yeah, he's diabetic I was behind him when he injected it before tryouts and someone asked him what it was."

I let him go and launched myself towards Coach Cedar. "NO don't!" I yelled snatching the still capped needle from his hand.

"What the hell are you doing Spena?"

"It's not Insulin. The kid is on steroids."

"What?" He stood up and gave me a hard look, a look that told me that if I was wrong I might be messing with a mans life, but if I was right then I a investigation was going to be done strictly over my words. I stretched out my arm, keeping the needle as far away from coach O'Niall as if it could inject him from a three feet away.

"I'm telling you, it's not insulin. Toby go and see if anyone else knows what to do." Toby didn't run, he was too shocked and confused to move. 'NOW!" With another flash of fear in his eyes he took off, this time screaming for Gatorade.

"You know that is a serious accusation Toni-"

"I'm not making it up, you can test the kid if you want, but I can guarantee that he is not diabetic."

Toby arrived a few seconds later as Coach Cedar was debating whether or not I was telling the truth gatorade in hand. "What the hell is that for?" I demanded as he held it out to me.

"I don't know! Don't he need sugar?" Not wanting to explain how Insulin works both coach Cedar and I ignored him.

"Give me the needle. We're gonna have to have it tested, and no one let this Simmons kid leave until I get back."

When the paramedics arrived I, along with Toby and Coach Talent were sent back to inform the word on what was going on and that we were going to wait it out.

About ten minutes later the other coaches arrived back looking relieved.

"Coach O'Niall is going to be just fine, but we're going to knock off the rest of the tryouts for today and we'll see you all at the next one. Ryan Simmons, don't go anywhere we gotta talk to you."

Toby had already been spreading the rumour that Simmons was on steroids so it was no surprise as to why they needed him to stay. I felt a hand on my shoulder as everyone was clearing out.

It was Coach Cedar. "Hey. O'Niall got some insulin, he's gonna be okay. He's a little more perked up now, gonna be fine."

I let out the breath I didn't know I was holding. "That's great."

"We're getting the needle tested as well, I told coach O'Niall whats going on and he said thank you." I nodded not really needing the thanks but took it anyways. He took off to address Simmons then when he suddenly turned back around. "Oh yeah, he also said he owes you one."

Now that was something I could use.


	11. Chapter 11

BENNY POV

"Benny you are going to get yourself fired if you don't start paying attention!" Scott yelled at me as he came around the car I had just let fall from the lift.

"Never mind that, he'll get himself killed, what the hell is wrong with you?" Nathan demanded, I was thankful that it was only us three in the shop today, tuesday wasn't usually a busy day so my dad was okay with leaving myself and two apprentices together.

"Sorry, I didn't realize that it wasn't secure before I started lifting it." I muttered before moving past them to make sure I did it correctly this time. "I've just been kind of out of it lately."

Scott and Nathan we're my choice of company, they were the kind of people that felt as though just because they received an apprenticeship then they were the best mechanics we had.

They had both gone to college, so they had that over me, but I was being paid and knew as much as I would learn in college anyways.

However, despite their egos, they were the tow guys I actually tolerated working with, kind of.

"You've been out of it for a few days then. What's going on with you?"

Thankfully I didn't have to answer Scott's question as the chime from the front room went off.

It was someone I didn't recognize, which was a little weird considering I rarely came across anyone I didn't at least think I had seen before.

"Hi." She smiled. Light brown hair falling to her waist, and large brown eyes above freckled cheeks. "I uh, I think I have a flat tire?"

I raised an eyebrow at her. "You _think_ you have a flat?"

"It's still driveable, I guess, but I think there's a railroad spike in it or something."

"Did you drive over traintracks?"

"No."

"Okay, then how did one get in there?"

She shrugged. "That's how my friend Paola got a flat." She was the definition of beauty without brains. But at least she was nice.

"I'll take a look at it, you can either stay and wait or do you have someone to drive you home?"

A small blush came over her face to my confusion. "Are you offering to drive me home?"

Confused, I again raised an eyebrow at her. "Uh, no, do you have a friend to- you know what, take a seat over there, leave your keys with me I'll bring your car around and take a look, it shouldn't take long."

"Thank you so much!" she slapped her keys down on the desk and made her way over to sit in one of the many leather chairs we had available, in front of the small TV.

I took her keys and headed out to the shop again, only to nearly smack Nathan and Scott with the door. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Uh, looking at the insanely hot girl that just walked in. Is that Sunshine?"

"What?" I suddenly remembered that neither Nathan nor Scott were from here and lived a few towns over, therefore had never seen Toni before. "No, that's not her."

Though I did kind of understand, Toni did have long dark hair and pale skin but she had green eyes, not brown.

"Mind if I call dibs?" I wasn't sure if Nathan was talking to me or Scott, but I gave him a thumbs up anyways.

"Don't scare her off though, we need customers."

His middle finger was his response.

SUNSHINE POV

"Sunshine-" O'Niall groaned as I practically chased him around his office.

"You said that you owe me one."

"But letting _you_ try out for the team. . .Toni-"

I quickly stopped him from saying no again. "You let me do the drills with them, whats the difference in me actually trying out? Give me a fair shot."

"So long as there is a softball team at this school, there is no reason for you to be on this team."

"Other than the fact that I don't play softball, I play baseball."

"Please stop"

It had been about a half hour since I had firth asked to tryout for the team and at first he had ignored me, but now he was finding every excuse not to have me tryout.

I wasn't that interested in trying out, I had seen who had made the first cut and I was not impressed with their choices, it seemed it didn't matter that they treated me terribly, if they could play, they were going to make it through the next cut as well. I figured, that if I wanted something I should ask from something ridiculous first. "Anything else, Toni, ask, but even if I let you tryout there is no way I could put you on the team so there's no point in trying out unless you can become a boy in the next few weeks."

I fought the urge to smile. "Fine. Anything else?"

"If it's within my power then yes, anything else."

I straightened my shoulders and stared him straight in the eye. "You send a scout to where I'm from, and view eight sandlot kids play."

"What?"

"Send a scout to the Valley and view some kids play ball. That's it."

He stared at me with a furrowed brow."Toni I'm not looking for sandlot kids who play once a week-" This time I groaned with frustration.

"I played with those kids every single day since I was twelve. They're good."

"Sandlot ball is different from real baseball Toni."

Slamming my hands on the table I actually caught his full attention. "We play on a sandlot, we can't afford some expensive field and to pay entry fees for tournaments. I came from there and there is talent still remaining there."

"tryouts are already in action, if I just bring in a random kid-"

"Then you'll be doing what you did for the kids whose dad's paid to get them in. I'm not saying you have to take them on, just go and find some talent and if you don't find any then leave. But they deserve the same chance as anyone else."

He sighed, picking up some papers and the putting them down right away, not sure what to say or to do with his hands.

"You trusted my judgement enough to help out with the tryouts, trust me on this. You will find talent there."

He sighed but waived a hand and muttered a "Fine. But I make no promises that we will offer anyone a tryout." I smiled, I got my way mostly because I had been in the office harassing him for a little over an hour, but it was an agreement and I knew that that was all Benny was going to need.

"Hello?"

"Smalls!" I was surprised with how excited I was to actually talk to him, it had been a while and although I knew that he understood why I wasn't calling all the time, I still felt guilt rising up within me.

"Toni? Hey guys it's Toni!" I heard a chorus of excitement in the background.

"Whose all there?"

"Uh most of us." My stomach dropped, if Benny was there then I didn't know what I was going to say.

"Is Benny?"

"Uh no." He sounded guilty of something. "He's working tonight, sorry, did you want to talk to him?"

"No. I don't I need to talk to you guys about something."

"Hi Toni!" It was Grover who was yelling into the phone.

"Hey Tone, it's Ham, we need a woman's opinion on something-"

"Ham! Give the phone back to Smalls."

"Just one second. If a girl is angry and says she never wants to talk to you again and then gets mad that you don't call her-"

I rolled my eyes and cut him off right then. "Ham I don't have time for this, I am calling out of state!"

"Well it's for Yeah Yeah, but he's too embarrassed to ask because its Sandra Montroe and we don't even know why he's so into her, she looks like a monkey." Although it was incredibly rude, he wasn't wrong, Sandra was a pretty horrid person, inside and out.

I suddenly realized why I had called and snapped at him. "Give Smalls the phone."

"Fine but think about it and get back to me." There was some rustling, some yelling and then Smalls voice came back on.

"What do you need Toni?"

I sighed in relief. "I need you to make sure that Benny is batting on Thursday between one and one thirty." Knowing Smalls was the only one who wore a watch, I could trust him to follow through on this.

"Why?"

It was then that my smile went from ear to ear. "I have a scout coming to look at you guys on Thursday." There was some silence as I assumed he was telling the guys about it, but that wasn't the case.

"That's not a good idea."

"What? Smalls I know that you guys are already set on your college plans and stuff but-"

"No Sunshine.. . . I understand why you're sending a scout-"

"The fuck did you just say smalls?" It was squints.

"Toni listen to me. I know why you're sending a Scout to look at Benny but it's not a good idea."

It was then that the phone was being screamed into by the rest of the guys, all incredibly negative things about a scout coming to the sandlot.

Somehow, Grover got the phone from Smalls "Sunshine, a scout cannot come to look at Benny."

"What the hell is wrong with you guys? This is an amazing thing, not just for Benny but for all of you."

"None of us are interested in playing for a college team Toni, besides we all know that Benny is the only one good enough. But that's not the point Toni, We are telling you that sending a Scout to look at Benny is a waste of time."

I was a little pissed off, Benny was talented enough to make the team, and I knew that they were his friends so I didn't understand why they were so against him being scouted.

"You guys need to explain, and explain fast before I decide not to call you ever again."

There was a sigh, some more rustling and then the Phone was back in the hands of Smalls. I suppose none of them figured they could explain it without pissing me off more, except for smalls.

"Toni?"

"Yeah, I'm still here."

"Sending a scout to look at Benny is a waste of time. It's been going on for weeks, he's moody, he's short tempered, he's moping around-"

"So he's in a mood."

"Toni, he hasn't been able to hit a ball to the fence since he got back, and hasn't been able to even hit the ball in days. He's fumbling ground balls, he's missing the bag, he's getting out on steals, he's not paying attention. He's completely lost all his talent, he's playing worse than Phillips."

"Why-" I stopped, Benny was extremely talented, being in a rut was one thing but Smalls wasn't one to exaggerate and if Benny was doing this poorly then there was obviously something seriously wrong. "Why didn't you mention this before?"

There was a pause from Smalls. "We didn't want to make you feel bad."

"What?" It was then that the Phone was ripped from Smalls' hands and Squints was now on the phone.

"Toni you need to cancel the scout alright?"

"I can't, he's already headed out there."

"Well call him and tell him to go back."

"Squints I can't do that, I made a huge deal about it, It'll look bad."

"Won't it look worse if you send them to look at a shit player?"

I let out a groan of frustration, running my hand over my face. "Come on it's Benny, just figure out whats going on with him and fix it, you don't just lose your talent."

"We know what's wrong with him Toni, and it's nothing we can fix right now."

"Well what is it?!"

Benny hadn't mentioned anything bothering him in our phone calls, and the fact that he was keeping anything from me really hurt. What could he possibly be going through that he can't tell me?

There was some more rustling on the other end of the line and Smalls was back on the phone. "Toni, I don't think it's a good idea to tell you."

"Scott Smalls you will tell me right now!"

"It's you, Toni."

"What's me?"

"He's here, and you're there, that's the problem."

"I don't-"

"You're gone Toni. He's depressed about it, and now he can't focus on anything and he's deteriorating. Don't get upset about it, once you're back it'll all go back to normal."

I didn't have time to wait two months, A scout was going to be there in four days.


	12. Chapter 12

BENNY POV

There was definitely some kind of secret going on with the guys. One that I had absolutely no part in, and the worst part about it was that these guys couldn't keep a secret to save their life and somehow they were keeping one from me?

"Stop it!" I finally snapped at them. They had been crowded around the dugout for ten minutes claiming that they were coming up with some kind of play to get me out. "Can you idiots get on the field?"

"Give us a minute!" Ham yelled back.

"Will you tell me what the hell is going on? Cause I know that you guys aren't talking about a baseball play."

"You don't know that for sure." I rolled my eyes at them and dropped the bat in my hands. It was closing in on one o'clock and I was getting extremely annoyed, I hadn't been hitting the ball again and instead of allowing me to practice and attempt to get my groove back they were crowded in the dugout and refused to let me near them.

"FINE!" Squints yelled out before stomping onto the field.

"Finally." I picked the bat back up and waited for Tommy to take the mound. He had kind of become our new pitcher. He wasn't nearly as good as sunshine but he could get it over the plate which was just fine with us.

I did hit the ball, but it only dribbled down the third base line before rolling foul, it was then that I noticed someone walking onto the field, he wasn't in a suit but he was dressed decently well.

"Whose that?"

"Who cares?" Was Yeah yeah's response, his response was really quick, I stared at the man as he walked towards us along the fence, he was carrying a clip board and had on shiny black shoes.

"I care." I said back.

Ham hit me in the leg with his glove. "Come on Benny just bat." I watched as he walked around the field, and came to a stop at our dugout, taking a seat.

"Hey." I called to him.

"Benny don't-"

I ignored Ham again and called out to the guy again. "Hey! What the hell are you doing?"

The guy looked up from his clip board and raised an eyebrow. "Are you talking to me son?"

"Uh yeah." I scoffed. "Unless you're wearing a baseball uniform and come from a low income home, which I assume you don't by the looks of you, you're not allowed on the field."

"Benny shut up!" Tommy hissed at me.

"What are you doing here?"

"He's my uncle." Yeah yeah's voice blurted out, from shortstop. "He's here to watch me play but he has work to do so he has a clip board."

I looked at the man who looked even more confused than he had. "Who are you?" He asked Yeah yeah who waived him off. "Did Toni not tell you all about today?"

My heart skipped a beat at the sound of her name. "You know Toni?"

"Not officially-"

"We have a game to play uncle. . . . Joe. So if you don't mind, we're gonna finish it!" I shot a look at yeah yeah, he was grinning an odd smile and looked all anxious and sweaty. Something that happened when he was talking to a girl, and when he was lying.

"What the hell is going on?" I demanded dropping the bat once again.

"Nothing! We're gonna play a game!" Squints yelled from his spot in centre field.

I looked around at the guys then back at the man sitting in the dugout. "Okay who the heck is this guy?"

"He's my-"

"He's not your uncle Yeah Yeah, I'm not stupid. Hey, who the heck are you?"

"Okay." The man stood up sliding his pen on the clipboard obviously annoyed and fed up with our yelling, not only at each other, but at him. "Obviously there has been some kind of mistake so, I am just going to go. Sorry to have interrupted your-"

"NO YOU CAN'T LEAVE!" A new voice had joined the conversation, and I was ready to burst into tears if some kind of cruel joke was being played on me.

Standing only a few meters away from the infield was Sunshine.

"Toni?" Ham asked in bewilderment, everyone else seemed frozen and confused, but my feet seemed to move on their own as I practically sprinted towards her and swooped her up in my arms crushing her in my grip and spinning her around.

"Oh my god, you're actually here." I breathed into her neck as I put her down.

"Benny." She whispered grasping my head in her hands as she pulled away. "I love you but you have to pretend that we are only friends for a few minutes okay?" The words had barely left her mouth before she was marching opened armed to the rest of the boys who were now waiting patiently on the side.

"SUNSHINE!" The screamed together pulling her into a tight group hug.

I watched, completely dumbfounded as she embraced the boys and then promptly ran over to the man who was still standing in our dugout.

"I'm really sorry-"

"Toni did you not tell them that I was coming?"

She looked back at us then back to him. "No, I told them, it was just that one of them wasn't told. He gets nervous, so they thought that if they told him he might not perform as well."

The man sighed. "Toni, I don't like my time being wasted."

"It's not-"

"Toni, I know about the nerves people get. Which is why I watched these boys play for a half hour before I came and sat down. I'm sorry to say that I wasn't impressed."

I seemed to all click together. He was a scout, Toni had sent a scout to from the school she was helping with to come see us and all the guys knew about it.

Part of me wanted to yell at them, but a larger part of me was feeling the same embarrassment as when we had lost to Phillip's team in front of the scout.

Obviously he had seen me strike out, again, and again, and again.

"It's because he doesn't have a decent pitcher out here." Toni was making stuff up, saying whatever she had to in order to get the scout to stay but I wasn't so sure I wanted him to.

"Toni-"

"Three pitches. Let him hit. If he doesn't hit it, then you can leave."

"I can't take someone who can only hit a forty an hour pitch Toni."

"He's not gonna hit off forty miles an hour. Three pitches, that's all I'm asking you for okay?"

The scout looked at me, obviously still annoyed with the way I had spoken to him earlier, but he obviously knew who Toni was, and if anyone knew Toni, they would know she was one stubborn girl.

"Okay."

Toni didn't miss a beat as she pouched past him to grab an extra kit from the dugout, and rushed towards the mound.

"Base up!" She snapped at the boys who scrambled like ants under a magnifying glass. Her eyes stopped on me eyebrow raised, "Grab your bat Rodriguez. You have three pitches."

It was suddenly like Sunshine had never left. I had visited her, and it had been weird and hurtful to see her, but standing on the sandlot, glove in one hand and a ball in the other, it was like she never left.

I smiled, not about to waste the opportunity to play ball with her again for anything.

"Alright Benny! Lets see it!" Squints yelled from the field. I took my stance at the plate, and looked back at the scout who was watching intensely, I looked at Toni, the one who had brought him here, the one that had somehow made her way here just to make sure it all went to plan.

I looked back at the scout and gave him a smile before pointing to the sky above left field with the bat. "Left field." I told him.

Sunshine waited for me to get into stance, she then wound up and let fly one of fastest balls anyone had ever seen.

I don't even remember swinging, all I remember is the crack that bat made as it hit the ball well over the fence in left field.

It was the greatest feeling in the world.

"Yeah!" Ham screamed, tearing off his mask to watch the ball fly and and smack right into Mr Myrtles old house.

I smiled, my confidence came flooding back to me as Sunshine picked up another ball. The scout looked impressed but not sold yet, so I pointed my bat to right field. "Right Field." I told him.

Again, the ball sailed over the fence of right field.

"Centre field."

This time when I hit the ball, it felt different, it was one of the best swings I had ever executed, and this time no one knew where the ball landed, all we knew was that it landed well over the fence and possibly into the street.

The boys were cheering, jumping up and down, throwing gloves and hats in celebration and the scout only scribbled down something in his book.

Sunshine made his way over to him, and I followed after her.

"So, what'd you think?" She asked.

The scout looked at me then back at her. "You can pitch."

"That's what you have to say?"

"O'Niall know that?"

"What about Benny?"

There was a silence as he seemed to think about it. "Well the kid can play Toni, do you really think I'm going to pass him up after that?"

Toni let out a sound I had never heard her utter before, it reminded me of the sound a few of the girls made when they were asked to prom.

She launched herself into my arms hugging me tight. "So he's invited to tryouts?"

"He is. You think you can make it there for the next one?"

"I'll make sure he does."

The scout laughed. "Thanks Toni but I was actually talking to, Benny right?"

I nodded. "Yes sir, and I'm really sorry about-"

"Forget it. As for the rest of the team, I can offer then to come as well, it'll just take some-"

"No we're good!" Yeah yeah scared the shit out of me, I didn't realize he was right behind me. "No offence but we all have other things to do."

The scout didn't stay long after that, he took my name, a few details, my number and then he was gone.

"Did I just get scouted?"

"Yes!" Toni jumped into my arms again, giving me the kiss I had been craving since I saw her.

SUNSHINE POV

"Okay we need an explanation." Squints said, actually pulling me by my ponytail off of Benny. "How the hell did you get here?"

"I uh, I took Clara's car."

"You what?"

Benny tugged on my arm to get my attention. "You don't have a licence."

"You don't need one to drive a car."

"Yes you do."

"Not if you don't get caught."

"SUNSHINE THE BADASS! I am finally rubbing off on you." Ham clamped me on the shoulder, grinning like a fool.

The two who didn't look impressed were the ones that I expected. Benny, and Smalls, it wasn't surprising because the last time Smalls did something remotely bad was when he took his step-dad's baseball and Benny just didn't like me being reckless anyways.

"I didn't get caught." I reminded him. "Look I don't want to spend the time I have with you being lectured, alright?"

I knew Benny would have something to say to me later on, but for now he agreed.

The day was spent as it always was, playing baseball together, like nothing had changed.

"You're positive your parent's aren't coming home." I clarified with Benny for about the tenth time in two hours. I was tangled in his sheet, naked, and about one loud noise away from jumping from the bed and getting dressed.

Benny was holding one of the sheets around his waist as he walked around the room looking for his boxers that had been flung across the room somewhere.

"They're at my aunt and uncles, they'll probably only be home around midnight."

"Probably?"

"Sunshine, it's 6 o'clock and they left an hour ago, relax." Having sex in Benny's house almost felt like the ultimate betrayal. Benny's parent's had trusted us with while we were growing up to _not_ fool around, I guess that they assumed that we were already intimate since they stopped demanding the door be open when Benny turned seventeen, but it still felt weird.

Benny managed to find his boxers behind the dresser and quickly slipped them on, we were going to meet the guys in a few minutes, and I was not looking forward to it, considering they all knew what we were going when Benny said "We just want to catch up."

"Start getting dressed, we're supposed to be at the movies in ten minutes.'

"Do we have to?" I asked. Benny ignored me and threw me my shirt. "You know that they're going to tease us relentlessly, and besides, Ham can't sit through a movie and Tommy is always narrating what he thinks is about to happen." I started to get dressed, not really wanting to leave the warmth of the bed but knowing I had to.

"A two hour movie isn't going to be that bad. If it comes down to it, we'll just get kicked out again."

I rolled my eyes at that statement, but finished getting dressed anyways. We were the least favourite people to have around the theatre, as kids we were constantly getting kicked out for a variety of things, and had even been banned for a year from ages thirteen to fourteen but the ban was lifted when the movie theatre went under new management.

There was suddenly a banging at the door, an urgent and rather annoying banging that told us that something was not okay.

"I swear if that is Yeah yeah hiding from another date that went wrong." Benny snapped heading for the door.

"Wait what? You need to tell me about that later!" I called as I rushed after him, attempting to put my hair back in a decent ponytail.

It was Yeah yeah at the door but he wasn't alone, it was the whole gang and they looked worried. "We need to go."

"What?" Squints snatched my arm and pulled me out the door.

"We'll explain later, but we need to go now."

I let them pull me to the end of the driveway before stopping and pulling out of his grip. "Okay you need to tell me what's going on." The guys tended to overreact to everything, their emergencies varied from a pigeon eating ice-cream on the road to someone coming to bomb the house, so I really wanted to know what I was rushing for.

"We don't have time to explain!" Ham snapped.

I didn't even get to ask again when I head a sound that made my blood run cold. **_WHOOP WHOOP_**

"Dammnit!" Squints snapped looking down the street. It was a cop car, three cop cars to be exact, lights flashing coming down the street.

"What the hell did you guys do?" Benny demanded storming down the driveway.

"Nothing!"

I wasn't convinced, that it was nothing, but if they didn't want to tell me then I was going to have to wait a see what the police had to say.

The car stopped in front of us, blocking us in the driveway and creating a panic between all the guys.

It happened to be Yeah Yeah's dad who stepped out from the cars first. He looked pained to do what he had to do and thats when I knew that they had screwed up and he was about to arrest his own son.

"Toni. You're going to have to come with us."

I stared at him with wide and confused eyes. "What?"

"Toni you have to come with us okay?" Benny stepped in front of me.

"What's going on?'

Another officer, one which I did not recognize came and stood next to officer McClennan, "You have to cuff her." He whispered loudly, but he waived him off.

"There's no need for that."

"What's going on!?" Benny snapped again.

"Toni, is this Clara's car?" He gestured to the car that was parked behind Benny's truck. I nodded. "It was reported stolen, by you about two days ago."

"I told Clara I was going to take the car." I argued.

"But you took it without her permission, that's grand theft auto." I couldn't believes what I was hearing, when I left two days ago to come to the Valley, I had told Clara that I was taking the car, something that she wasn't happy about but she did give me the keys. She never verbally told me I could take the car but the keys were handed to me. "And you don't have a license. I'm sorry but we have to take you in."

I couldn't believe it, I had spent years being both abused and neglected by Clara and my father. I had been hit, ignored, yelled at, and verbally bullied by them.

Yet I ended up being the one who got arrested.

 **Authors Note: So I just suddenly realized, that I have been spelling Yeah Yeah's last name wrong this entire time. . . . . that's embarrassing LOL.**

 **I will be fixing that in the preceding future, sorry if anyone noticed and it was driving you insane!**

 **Hope you're all having a good week and have an even better weekend. The colleges in Ontario are all on strike, now going into its 5th week, the longest strike ever to happen here so I hope if any of you are experiencing it, that it gets resolved soon and you're not too badly affected by it.**

 **Happy reading!**


	13. Chapter 13

SUNSHINE POV

I did end up getting handcuffed, but it was only because the boys wouldn't let go of me, handcuffing me seemed to make them back off because it was hurting my wrists too much for them to hold on.

I wasn't put in a holding sell, thankfully, I was placed in the triaging section, with my hands cuffed and sitting on a small bench. A place that anyone could come in and see exactly who had been bad person.

A mother came to get her underaged and intoxicated son, and a boy whom I thought I recognized came in trying to tell them that he was another boy's older brother, but they wouldn't release him to him.

"You're not expecting to have Clara come get me are you?" I asked the lady at the desk behind the window. She ignored me. "Cause if you are, we're gonna have a long wait."

She looked up at me but only to look back down at the paperwork she was filling out. I wasn't told I had the right to remain silent, and I wasn't read my rights, so they didn't plan on keeping me here long.

Mr. McClennan came out of the back room, his hat off and his tie a little bit looser, he held a set of keys in his hand which I was very excited to see. He motioned for me to stand and undid the cuffs.

"Can I leave?" He shook his head.

"You're underage, you need to be released to a parent, or a responsible authority figure."

"I don't know where we're going to find one of those." He sighed and placed the cuffs in his pocket and the keys around his belt.

"Look Toni I'm really sorry this had to happen to you."

"Then let me go. I told you, she gave me the keys, she handed them to me after yelling at me about wanting to take her car."

"What about driving without a license?"

"You wouldn't have even known if she hadn't called you." He ran a hand through his thinning hair, and I realized I should probably tone it down, this job had obviously added a lot of years to him. "I'm sorry that I did it but I needed to come down here."

"There's nothing I can do Toni, we have to wait for someone to take responsibility for you. Clara said she wouldn't press charges."

"Press charges? What's she going to come after my baseball bat?"

I didn't have money, and it was obvious that Clara knew that as well, it was still irking to know that she had called the police not only on Benny but on me as well, but it also wasn't at all surprising.

It was then that the sandlot boys came bursting into the waiting room, I was extremely surprised to realize that it was their first time ever being here.

"My client has the right to remain silent!" Ham announced arm raised as he burst through the door holding a piece of paper in his hand. "Toni don't say a word."

"Ham!" Mr. McClennan yelled at him as he stomped over to us, shoving the letter at him. "Ham this is a place of business and law, you cannot behave like this."

"I have a right to represent my client and I have here a written statement that prevents her from being charged of all and any crimes."

"Ham I already admitted to everything." I snapped at him rolling my eyes. "can you guys stop him?" I demanded.

"What do you think we've been trying to do the whole walk here?" Timmy demanded.

"Silence in the courtroom!"

"Ham stop it." I snapped snatching the paper from him, which happened to be just chicken scratch hand writing of his that said I was innocent and there were seven other witnesses to that.

"You're not my lawyer."

"Anyone can be appointed your lawyer."

"Not you.

"Why not?"

"Well for one you need to pass highschool first." Ham immediately dropped his act and turned to face me, actual hurt on his face.

"Why do you have to go there?"

Benny stepped him immediately pushing Ham away from me and Officer McClennan "Can we not do this now? Mr. McClennan, can Sunshine leave here yet?"

"I'm sorry Benny but we need someone to come and take her out of here. An adult, not Ham."

"Dad can't she-"

He turned on his son right away. "I would keep my mouth shut if I was you, we are going to have a long talk about _not,_ trying to hide criminals, when you find out I'm coming."

Yeah Yeah slunk back behind Grover as his dad wagged a finger at him, reprimanding him for his actions.

"Look you know Clara is not going to come for her, and her dad. . ." Benny started.

"I know, we're still working on his whereabouts."

"My parents will be home in an hour or so, will that do?"

He sucked in a breath thinking and looking around. "Look I can but only because everyone here knows you all. We're keeping the car, and we'll get it to Clara some way but since she's not charging you then we can let you go once they get here."

"Thank you." I said feeling some relief, the Valley wasn't the most crime driven place but I still didn't want to sit next to the people they brought in at midnight.

"Wait, if theres no charges then why did you bring her in?" Smalls asked.

"Clara called her in as a missing person." Right, because I'm sure she was so concerned about me being gone, AFTER I TOLD HER WHERE I WAS GOING.

I kept my thoughts to myself though as Mr. McClennan gave us a smile, gave Yeah Yeah a stern look and then headed back into the back room with the permission to have Benny wait with me.

We were sitting in silence for a few minutes when I broke it. "If this doesn't make your parents demand you break up with me I don't know what will." I said. Benny chuckled and threw his arm around my shoulders.

"I have a badass girlfriend."

"You have a criminal, and stupid girlfriend."

"I don't think this counts as criminal behaviour. And you're not stupid."

I rolled my eyes at him. "Benny, I should have known Clara was planning something the second she handed me those keys."

"I know she's horrible, but why would she do that? I thought she was trying to paint this, _perfect family,_ image."

"She's trying to create an awful image about me. So when I'm eighteen and she kicks me out no one will blame her for doing it."

Benny nodded, understanding. "So I guess I'll be driving down to the tryouts with you in the passenger seat?" I smiled as best as I could, the thought made me happy.

"Wait, aren't the cops still looking for you, cause of the last time you were here?"

"I'll take my chances." He said with a grin. It had been long enough that there were probably a lot bigger issues than him. The police probably didn't even remember, we just had to make sure that Clara didn't see him.

"What are your parents going to say?"

"They're happy about it."

"You told them?"

"Yeah, it was kind of a cushion to the whole, Toni got arrested thing."

I groaned rubbing my forehead violently. "Those weren't the words, or the explanation you used is it?"

"No." He promised and pulled me closer.

The bench was uncomfortable, and after seeing two more drunk high school kids and a man with a very questionable look in his eye came and gone, our buts were numb.

It was then that Mr. and Mrs R. came running into the room. "Toni? Toni are you hurt?" Mrs. R asked grasping my face in her hands.

"I'm fine."

"What's wrong with you? Arresting this poor girl for no reason." I furrowed my brow and looked at Benny who smiled sheepishly. He did tell them why I was here didn't he? "Let her go now."

The lady behind the desk looked bored, bored and ready to just go home. "She can go as soon as you sign her release papers."

"Why did you lock her up anyways."

"Mom she's not locked up."

"They put handcuffs on her." Benny's mom was definitely a mama bear, she usually kept to herself but when provoked she would tear your head off. Part of the reason Benny never told her about Phillips, he was sure she would neuter the boy if she knew half the things he did to our team.

The papers were signed and stamped, Mr McClennan was notified, and he waived me off from behind the glass, scared of what Mrs. R might do to him.

Not surprisingly the boys were waiting outside the door for me, Grover smoking a cigarette which Mr. R took out of his mouth and stomped on.

"I assume that the proper punishment for getting arrested in your family would be a grounding?" I asked raising an eyebrow at Benny.

Benny shrugged "Yeah, but they're not your parents, they can't ground you."

"Toni why were you in holding?" Mr. R asked me.

"What did Benny tell you?"

"That you were arrested for false accusations." I nodded, deciding that the truth was something better left a mystery and agreed wit him.

They seemed more angry with the fact that they arrested me other than why I actually got arrested, so they gave me a hug saying how nice it was to see me and then drove off.

"Benny why did you tell them that?'

"Because if I told them the truth then they would have left you in there for the night to learn your lesson."

He wasn't wrong, they didn't really care when it wasn't your fault but if they knew it was, they were more brutal with punishment than the cops.

We did end up going to the movies, having to see the only film that wasn't sold out, and was so boring that we ended up getting asked to leave after Squints and Grover got into a race up and down the aisles.

The only thing I could focus on the entire time was the idea of Clara calling the cops on me, reporting me missing and that I stole her car. The only reason I got out of there was because Mr. McClennan knew me, and was not going to let me stay there for reasons he knew not to be entirely true.

I was focused on the idea of Clara, and how at eighteen I had plans to leave her home, and she had the plans to kick me out. The situation didn't seem so grim as it did right now, Benny was coming to the tryouts, and I knew that Benny was going to make the team, that made me happy.

But it also meant that he would have the enrol at the school for something, he'd get in, O'Niall would make sure of that, but he would be at the school for at least a year depending on what he chose to study. Which meant I was going to be there for a year.

I had no plan beyond my birthday, it was simple when I knew I was going to go home and stay with Benny for a little while until I got a job, but I didn't have that option anymore.

I wondered if Benny knew it to, and if he did he didn't seem concerned about it, so maybe I shouldn't either.

However, no matter what the situation was, I had less than two months to figure it out.


	14. Chapter 14

SUNSHINE POV

"You didn't tell me he was your boyfriend." O'Niall snapped at me from behind the dugout. We had just arrived after an extremely long drive from the Valley and we had no time to stop and get settled.

I realized that I probably should have told Kenny not to mention that Benny and I were in a relationship before we got there since he was the one that yelled out "It's the hottest couple in the baseball world!" when he saw us pull up.

The boys that practiced with Benny weren't too impressed to see him there knowing his batting was going to show them up for sure.

Benny was going to be staying with Kenny for a few weeks until he figured out if he made the team and what to do from that point on, but Benny was happy to be reunited with his friend, no matter how bad he possibly made his chances.

"It doesn't mean he's not a good player."

"It's a conflict of interest Toni, same as if I had my son come and tryout."

"It's a conflict if he's not good and you put him on the team."

He rubbed his forehead in aggravation. "Toni I made the exception and brought him in mid-tryouts and now people are going to think it's because you two are together."

"Who cares what they think? Let him prove his talents on the field."

"Look I understand what you're saying but this is a business and happens to be my job. If people can find any reason to complain and make excuses for why their kid didn't make the team, this is going to be it."

I completely understood why he was upset that I didn't tell him, but this is the reason why I didn't. He would have assumed that I was asking him to bring Benny to the tryouts only because we were dating.

"Tryouts were supposed to start ten minutes ago can we just forget about this until they're over. I'm telling you once they see him play there will be no question as to why he's here."

"Fine but you stay far away from him at all times." I raised my hands to tell him that was fine with me and let him walk past me to begin the tryouts.

"Alright boys, head out to your primary positions." The boys took off making a line at each of their main positions except for Benny. He wasn't sure where to go, Benny rotated every position, he wasn't sure what he was best at.

"Problem son?"

"Uh."

"Benny, go to short stop." I told him, he looked at me and nodded taking off towards the field. I could feel all the coaches eyes piercing a hole in my head. "He's never been to a tryout alright?

Cut him some slack. At the sandlot we rotate all positions." I knew I shouldn't but I felt like an ass coming up with excuses for Benny not knowing his primary position.

None of us had ever been to a real tryout before and it wasn't his fault if he wasn't expecting to pick only one position but still I felt like I was a pushy mom trying to make excuses for why

her mediocre son wasn't doing well.

I needed Benny to prove his worth, and fast.

BENNY POV

I felt like and idiot, I should have just ran to any position but I had to stand there like a compete moron looking all confused.

I filled the extra positions and I never really got fully comfortable in one position, I knew I could perform anywhere but it suddenly hit me that I was trying out with some really good players, and they all probably had been playing only one position their entire life.

"You're dating Toni?" A voice asked from behind me. It was tall lean redheaded boy, he looked nice enough but after years of handling Phillips, I was skeptical about any rich kid.

"Yeah, we've been together since we were twelve." I answered.

"Twelve? Jesus, how did that happen?"

"Huh?"

"C'mon, five years? You guys must have broken up at some point." I shook my head getting slightly annoyed with him. "So it's safe to say that she's the _only_ girl you've been with?" He was teasing me, and although it was lighthearted I still got a little pissed off. The other guys were listening to us and I knew it was probably weird for my to only have ever been interested and dated one girl but.. .

"She's all I need. All anyone would ever need." I didn't mean for it to sound sexual, but apparently thats what he meant when he asked if I had only ever been with _one_ girl.

They cat called and ooooo'd at my statement which I only ignored, they were being immature, and despite being raised with Ham and Squints it made my skin crawl.

I took my position waiting for the play to be called out and the ball to be hit when I heard from behind me "Thanks for confirming our suspicions."

"What?" I demanded turning around just as the ball was hit. It bounced and hit me in the leg and rolled off to the side.

"Rodriguez what the hell are you doing?!" One of the coaches yelled at me. I was embarrassed and angry at myself for letting them distract me, but I was also mad at what they had said.

"Sorry." I called back getting back into position as the boys snickered.

The ball was hit again, and this time I played it clean and threw it to first before heading to the back of the line. Sunshine was standing off to the side with another coach who held a clip board, she looked at me with a raised eyebrow but I only waived her off.

I ran to the back of the line, realizing that this line was long, there were at least twenty other boys trying out for shortstop so if that was my only chance, I might have just blew it.

"Toni is a good looking girl." I was broken from the thoughts by a blonde boy who moved from his position to come and stand in front of me. "She's a good looking girl, they're going to make comments no matter who her boyfriend is, don't take it personally."

"I'm not taking it personally." I snapped at him. "It's Toni that I'm trying to stick up for."

"Easy, I'm on your side." He said, "My girlfriend is a cheerleader, she's always getting hit on and stuff."

I wanted to tell him that there was a difference between Sunshine being one of the authority figures at tryouts and boys making comments, and his girlfriend wearing a skirt and boys making comments but I guess there was no point. If Toni was a cheerleader rather than a ball player I would have the same anger I do now.

Toni watched from the foul line with a clipboard and wrote down what the other coaches had to say. We went through the line about three more times, each play I made cleanly, and we were then given a break.

"Shortstop Benny? I always expected to see you in centre field." Kenny said coming up behind me.

"Toni told me to go to shortstop, but I'm with you, I think I'd be doing better in the outfield."

"You haven't screwed up yet."

"Are we going to do any hitting?"

Kenny nodded, taking a sip of water. "Yeah, that's what we're going to do for the rest of practice, hitting drills."

"Drills?"

"Yeah, hitting, bunting, slap bunting, pepper, and so on."

I stopped him there. "Whose pitching?"

Kenny shrugged. "Depends on who they ask."

I looked over to where Toni stood with the coaches then back to Kenny. "Why doesn't Toni just pitch to us?"

Kenny laughed, but noticing my serious face he stopped. "Benny come on, they're not gonna let Toni pitch to us."

"Why not? she's good enough"

"Yah she is, you and I know that, but they won't let her because she's a girl. Do you know how badly they'll want to cream the ball if she pitches? And how angry they're going to get if she strikes them out? There aren't any girls in this league and so it doesn't make sense to have us hit off a girl if we're not going to in a game."

"I don't get it. Toni is better than any boy here."

"But she's not a boy. Don't you remember how badly we all wanted you to strike her out when she first came? How badly we all wanted to hit off her? It completely threw us off and we lost all our focus on mechanics and just wanted to hit the ball. We sucked."

Kenny was making sense, When we played against Phillips there was such a desire not to fail that sometimes we just forgot all about our mechanics and swung completely willy nilly.

However, it still bothered me that they considered her a distraction.

"Does anyone respect her around here?" I asked

Kenny softened at that and lost his playful nature. "Hey come on, you know I didn't mean it like that."

"Not you Kenny, but guys have been making comments about her this entire time. She's a factor in deciding if we make the team, doesn't that mean anything?"

Kenny shook his head. "Not to them. Look I love Toni, and I have the upmost respect for her, but until she proves her skills they're not going to stop with their stupid comments."

"I thought she showed her skills already."

"Benny, at the sandlot it's different, looking better than Phillips isn't hard, but she's surrounded by guys who have been playing their entire lives. It doesn't matter if she's as good as they are she has to prove that she's better or they're never going to change their minds."

I didn't realize what a bubble we seemed to live in. The best competition we ever faced was at the annual community tournament, and we were always head and shoulders better than the rest of them, Toni was the only one of us to play on another team, before the sandlot, it didn't take long for her to change our minds but we were still pretty young and impressionable. These guys had probably never seen a girl play ball before and had developed an opinion on it.

"Are you going to be able to get through the rest of the tryouts?" I nodded, and he gave me a wide Kenny smile before hitting my shoulder with his glove.

SUNSHINE POV

I couldn't tell if Benny was impressing the other coaches, they were marking him on a tough scale, that I knew but they didn't show any kind of emotion, and I thought it was inappropriate to ask.

He did great in his hitting, he hit almost every single ball over the fence, the only problem was that, so did a lot of the other boys.

When tryouts ended, the didn't talk to me about Benny either, they just took my clip board and went off to their cars so they could discuss the cuts.

In frustration I kicked on of the buckets, not realizing it was half filled with balls.

"Dammnit." I snapped, before bending down to pick them up.

"Here let me help." It was the Adam kid. . . .last name Annex I think, couldn't remember if he told me so himself or I had read it on the roster list.

"It's fine." I told him.

"It's okay."

I slammed the ball I was holding into the bucket and glared at him. "If you're going to kiss someones ass Adam, I suggest it be one of the coaches."

"Jeez." He said picking up the last few balls. "Didn't realize you were in a bad mood. I hope you weren't evaluating me today with that kind of attitude."

I immediately felt bad, and a little bit worried and embarrassed, hopefully if he was cut he wasn't going to blame it on my poor attitude. "You're welcome, by the way." He took off then towards a group of boys that happened to be watching our encounter.

"Fuck." I snapped.

"Toni, language." Kenny laughed coming up behind me, Benny walking in step with him. "What did Annex, have to say?"

"He was just helping me pick up the balls" I muttered.

"You okay?" Benny asked.

"No. I'm pissed off. One minute I'm of good use and they value my opinion and the next they're excluding me from choices because I'm bias."

Kenny smiled throwing an arm around me and leading me out of the field. "Hey once they see Benny's talent they'll let you off the hook."

"They didn't see my talent today?" Kenny ignored him and continued.

"They have to treat you like shit so they team doesn't think your bias either."

He had a point. "I guess you're know it's still early. You want to do something tonight?"

"We have a day or two until the next tryout, I say we get drunk."


	15. Chapter 15

SUNSHINE POV

Getting drunk to Kenny meant going to some kind of trailer park, surrounded by strange and terrifying looking groups of residents.

They were nice enough but they kept to themselves almost observing the rest of the party, and the other guests that were in attendance, most of which were rowdy college kids.

A few of the boys from the tryouts were there but they were unrecognizable without their uniforms and overly polite demeanour. Now instead of acting like perfect honour students trying to pad their resume, they were drunk, crazy, and obnoxious frat boys.

And I thought Ham could drink a lot.

Benny was attempting to mingle, but since he hadn't had to make any new friends since he was ten, it was a little difficult, he was looking for people who were exactly like the sandlot boys, but he wasn't finding anyone.

I on the other hand was sitting in the bed of Benny's truck, looking around at all the chaos going on. A few people attempted to talk to me, but it turned into them getting bored and walking off, almost forgetting that we were having a conversation.

"Hey Toni." It was Kenny, I turned towards his voice, he was holding a beer in one hand and the hand of a girl in another.

"Hey." I smiled.

He snatched the cup in my hand, forgetting about the girl, and took a sip. He gagged and spat the contents on the ground nearly missing the girls shoes.

"Toni, if your drink becomes warm it means you're not drinking it fast enough."

I shrugged, it was the same beer that Kenny had handed me tow hours ago when we first arrived. "Where's Benny?"

This time Kenny shrugged. "Around, last I saw him some of the boys were making him a shot of something."

I rolled my eyes, hoping down off the truck, Benny was supposed to only have a couple drinks and then drive us back, not get wasted.

"Thanks."

I drew a lot of attention as I walked through the groups of college students, I stood out being the only one who was able to walk without tipping over, and the fact that I had been the talk of the town for the past month.

I didn't know it until complete strangers knew my name and were asking me about how I managed to be apart of the coaching staff for the boys team.

Something they didn't get was that I wasn't part of the coaching staff, I was at most the equipment manager and had received a nasty message on my answering machine a few hours ago for leaving the field in such disarray. I was in such a bad mood that I had forgotten to clean up after the tryouts.

But the players saw me at tryouts and I was writing notes and making a minuscule contribution to who was given an invitation back, and that was enough for on lookers to think I was some kind of coach.

I found Benny, he was sitting on a couch on someones porch, four girls were squished on the couch with him chattering away. At the other end of the porch three guys stood looking on in jealousy.

I walked up the steps catching the boys attention, "Hey coach Spena." One of them greeted smiling, he was from the tryouts but I had no idea who he was. "You come to collect your boy? You might want to get him quickly before he leaves with someone else." I looked towards the couch where Benny was talking to one girl while another had her hand on his thigh stroking it carefully. He seemed completely unaware of the action.

"Oh my God. What did you do get him drunk?" I demanded gesturing to the scene before us.

"We didn't force him to do anything." A shaved headed boy with a awfully done spider tattoo said. "We just might have encouraged it."

The third boy was a shaggy head brunette that looked like he had just finished burning down a building, he looked like a trouble maker, the kind that stabbed bunnies when he was a kid.

"You're Benny's girlfriend?"

"What are they broadcasting it now?"

He raised an eyebrow at me. "Easy sassy, I'm just asking."

"Well yeah I am."

"You're not what I expected."

I decided to ignore him, he was probably trying to piss me off. "One of those girls belong to you or something?" I asked, choosing to try and piss him off too.

"Sorta, the brunette with the hand on his leg." I looked to see that her hand had slid up a little bit, Benny still unaware.

"She seems like a keeper."

"We hang out, but she knows that she's not my type." I rolled my eyes, he reminded me a bit like Ham in that aspect, but at least Ham had some respect for girls and didn't like them flirting with other boys in front of him.

"Nice."

"Easy." The bald headed boy said. "He's not her type either. It's just casual."

"Besides." The shaggy headed kid said. "Isn't that whats going on with you a latino romeo over there?"

"No, we've actually been dating for about 6 years."

"Ah that's too bad."

"Why?"

"Cause _you're_ my type." I left him and his friends standing there laughing after me. Benny noticed me walking up to him then and smiled brightly before standing and giving me a hug.

"Hey Sunshine, where have you been?"

"Same place you left me an hour ago." I didn't mean to sound bitter but I was tired, Benny didn't seem to notice anyways as her pulled me into another hug.

I could smell the liquor coming off of him and I couldn't help but feel annoyed, I kew he was just having fun but dealing with two drunks was not something I wanted to deal with especially in this place, where I didn't really know anyone.

Benny pulled me down off the porch by the hand and pulled me through the crowd of people.

Benny was rushing so fast through the lane of people that he lost his balance, stumbled and fell, taking me with him, to the chorus of laughter.

"Better watch your step." Someone said from above us, I had landed with my head on Benny's stomach, and looked up to see Adam looking down at us.

"Did you fucking trip us?" I demanded pushing myself up from the soft dirt. His grin told me that he did, and I snapped, "What the hell is wrong with you?" I shoved him hard, but he only moved a couple steps.

"Hey!" A chorus rung out at my actions, Adam was laughing heavily spilling his drink as her shook violently with laughter.

Benny had scrambled to his feet, sobering slightly but still unaware of what was going on. "Do you have a problem with us?"

"Do you realize how ridiculous you look? It's like a bunny rabbit getting angry." Adam managed to get out before laughing again.

Benny pulled on my arm. "Toni, he's just drunk."

"I don't give a damn." I told Benny, "everyone's drunk but no one is tripping us for no damn reason."

"Toni seriously, let it go."

"Listen to your boyfriend Coach Spena, cause neither of you could win this argument."

I raised an eyebrow at him. "Are you threatening us?" Benny pulled on my arm again but I shook him off. "Are you telling me that you would beat us up if we started fighting with you?"

"I'm not saying that." He grinned. "Wouldn't be a fight anyways."

"Adam leave your Coach alone, she could have you cut from the team." Someone called out from the crowd.

"She ain't a coach, she's just a water girl."

My anger boiled, there wasn't much I could say to him other than I thought he was an idiot, but for some reason in all my anger and embarrassment I found something else to do, which was spit right in his face.

"Whoa!" Benny's voice rang out as he immediately pulled me by the waist away from a steaming mad Adam and towards his car. "Toni what the heck was that?"

"He deserved it." I snapped.

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean you can do it. You have a job now, you can't do things like that."

I ignored him, getting into the drivers seat, Benny knew he was too drunk to drive even with a bit of sobering up.

I didn't know why I did it, I mean I was angry, but there were going to be repercussions for what I did.

And boy, was I ever right.


	16. Chapter 16

"You spit on a boy."

"Boy? Don't try to make it seem like I spit on some helpless 3 year old, Adam is older than me and also a lot bigger."

Coach O'Nial was angry and it was evident with how red his face was. "You know you have a lot of attitude for someone who is on very thin ice on loosing their job."

I slumped in my chair and sighed, knowing that my attitude wasn't going to get me very far if I continued on. "It doesn't matter how old he is, you are technically a superior and you spit on him."

"What about what he did to me and Benny?"

"I understand what he did but he's claiming that it was an accident, and is easily played off as such. You spitting on him wasn't an accident, Toni." He fell into his own chair pinching his eyes together. "You represent the school now, what you did was seen as unprofessional and almost abusive." I kept my mouth shut about that. "I don't have much of a choice since almost everyone is claiming that you have an anger problem, as well as a drinking problem."

"What?" I snapped forwards in my chair. "I was sober."

"Which probably isn't your best argument. If you blame it on alcohol it's just some kind of drunken action, if you say you were sober then you have rage issues."

"What about me driving home? won't someone have something to say about that?"

He sighed. "Look Toni, no matter how you spin the story, I still have no choice but to demote you."

"Demote me how?" I wasn't sure how lower in the ranks I could get, I was already a girl with no influence.

"You're officially equipment manager only, which means during tryouts and practices you set everything up, collect balls, watch clean up and go home. You also get water and-"

"I'm not going to be referred to as a _water girl._ "

"Toni-"

"These guys already don't have any respect for me, and you're going to make me fetch them water and pick their balls up for them?"

"Respect is earned Toni, not just given. You want more influence, you have to pay your dues."

I didn't say anything else, there was nothing to say, I had spit in Adam's face and I had to suffer the consequences, I was just pissed off that Adam was getting off.

I left his office in a huff pulling the door open and storming out, nearly hitting a student as I did.

"Hey!" Kenny called after me as I stormed down the hallways, I had almost forgot him and Benny had been waiting for me. "Sunshine what happened?"

"I'm a fucking water girl now, that's what happened." I snapped, fists clenched I marched down the hall and towards the large stairs that would lead me to the main corridor of the school and

out to the parking lot.

"What about Adam?"

"Speak of the bastard." Benny hissed, I looked up from my shoes to see that Adam was making his way up the staircase, a embarrassed look on his face as he saw me.

"Toni, can I talk to you.'

Benny answered for me. "No."

"Look I'm sorry okay?"

I rolled my eyes, "if you were sorry you wouldn't have told O'Niall that you tripped me by accident and that my spitting at you was nothing but a fit of rage."

"It was an accident. Toni I'm sorry I was really drunk, I don't even remember two nights ago."

"So that's my problem?"

"I get stupid when I'm drunk."

"And for some reason that didn't come up in conversation with the coach did it?"

Adam looked down at his shoes as if he was being reprimanded by his mother for spilling soda on the rug, he looked almost childish. "I'm really sorry, but he promised me he wasn't going to fire you. Baseball is all I have, if I get banned from tryouts I have nothing. I panicked, and I am truly really sorry."

I walked past him then, he sounded sincere but I was too angry to accept his apology at that moment but he stopped me, grabbing my arm.

"Hey don't touch her!" Benny snapped, and Adam let go like I had burned him.

"I'm sorry, Toni really I am."

I rolled my eyes and turned to face him fully. "It doesn't matter Adam, not only did you get me demoted from my job by provoking me, you also made me look like an idiot in front of everyone trying out. You made me a bigger joke than I already am." I continued walking then, the next cut was being made and the list was going to be put up at 1 o'clock. They at least shared that much information with me, everyone else would be notified at one thirty that it was up to avoid the mass crowd of angry teenagers.

It was 1:06 and we were practically running to the field when we arrived in Benny's truck.

"I don't think I've ever been this nervous." Benny said, he was practically jumping out of his skin.

"What about when Squints almost drowned?" Kenny asked.

"I was more nervous about what Wendy was going to do to him. But I guess you're right, this is a close second."

The list was posted on the back of the dugout, I didn't blame Benny for being nervous he had a lot less time to impress the coaches then anyone else did, there was going to be a major cut and then Benny was going to be heading into the final tryout before the exhibition tournaments, that was when he was going to really shine.

My heart nearly jumped out of my chest when I saw Kenny's name first on the list, It meant that I had to look through all the names to find Benny's it wasn't in alphabetical order, and my heart rate leapt more and more as I scanned through the sea of names.

"Oh thank God!" Benny yelled throwing his fist in the air. I managed to breathe out when I saw his name, second to last on the list of names, right before Adam Annex.

There were a few more that I recognized and a few that I could only assume were still here because of Daddy's money.

"Congratulations." I said giving them each a hug. "I'm glad you guys are sticking around."

"You know, we should go back to the Valley for a day or two, you know before the guys go off to school." Benny said as we walked back to the truck. "Kenny you should come too."

"You better fucking believe I'm coming, I'm still pissed at you for going without me."

"Me?" I asked when I saw his finger pointed at me. "You're the one who moved away."

"My parents made me."

"If I recall every single one of us offered to hide you in our basements, and you still went."

"Shut up." He laughed. "Anyways, yeah I'm definitely coming. When?"

Benny shrugged pulling his truck door open, "I'm thinking after tryouts, you know before school starts."

"That reminds me, have to told the coaches what you want to apply for if you get on the team?"

"They don't have an automotive program here." He shrugged. "Maybe architecture."

"Benny you hate math, how are you going to do that?" Kenny asked jumping into the back."

"It was just a thought. I was also thinking Sports Science."

"I could see you going that." I said. "But you know it probably means learning about another sport other than baseball."

"Men have a natural ability to understand any sport." Kenny stated from behind us. Benny started the engine and pulled out of his spot and towards the road.

"Then how do you explain Smalls?" I asked raising an eyebrow.

"How does anyone explain Smalls, Smalls is a rarity, an outlier."

Benny placed his hand on my knee catching my attention. "What about you?"

"What about me?"

"You accept your offer yet? To Social services?" My silence was his answer. "God damn it Toni, why not?"

"If I accept the offer I'm going to be stuck with Clara for who knows how many years."

"It's a two year course."

"I can't live with Clara for two more years Benny."

Kenny leaned forward in his seat. "So what do you plan on doing? Benny's gonna be here for at least two years Sunshine, what are you going to do in that time?"

"I'll save up from working here and then move out or something when I turn 18 like I planned before."

"How cheap do you think apartments are? I know you're not making enough to live on your own Toni, you only work a few hours a week."

"And when the season starts I'll be working more."

Benny cut in then. "So why not move out, work and all that stuff _and_ go to school?"

"Benny students are only allowed to work so many hours. I have a part time employment right now, but I can work as much as I want. If I'm a student they'll only let me work twelve hours a

week. That means I can't go to games or tournaments, I can only make the practices and would even have to leave early for some."

"It's your education. What do you plan on doing when this is all over? You won't have a college degree."

"I can go to college at any point."

"But-"

"Benny." I snapped. He shut his mouth quickly and glanced at me from the corner of his eye. "The only thing that matters is getting out of that house. I'm seventeen and look what she did last night."

"Whoa." Kenny said jumping in. "What happened last night?"

I didn't want to tell him, Kenny had a temper, he always had and although I hadn't seen it since I got to Florida, something told me that it hadn't gone anywhere.

Kenny was also kind of wasn't a realist, he saw things as they should be and not how they are, in his mind the cops would be called, I would be taken away from Clara and move in with him and everything would be okay.

But things didn't work that way and it would be one hell of a time trying to convince him otherwise.

Benny unfortunately did it for me. "She threw a vase at her."

"Huh?"

"She threw a fucking vase at her." He repeated.

"Why?"

"Kenny what reason could she possibly have that would justify throwing a vase at her?"

I cut in then before Benny got too heated up.

"She was mad at me for not signing up for school yet. A letter stating that I only had a week or two left to confirm my offer arrived and she wasn't too happy about it."

"So she threw a vase at you?"

"After a few minutes of yelling and name calling yeah. It's not like it hit me, it hit the wall "

Benny's hands tightened on the wheel so his knuckles turned white. "Tell him the rest." When I didn't say anything he turned to look at me, and said through his teeth. "Tell him." I had been hoping that Benny would leave the rest out but of course he didn't.

"I cut my leg. She pushed me, I fell onto the broken glass and I cut my leg."

"Christ Sunshine, we should just-"

"We're not calling the cops." I said instantly. That conversation seemed to die quickly, because they didn't say anything else, I watched out the window as the houses flew by. "Wait where are

we going?" We were on route to Kenny's house.

"Dropping Kenny off."

"Why? I thought we were going to eat."

"We are." Benny confirmed.

'Sorry Sunshine." Kenny said. "Benny kicked me out of our lunch plans, he wants time alone with you."

Benny smiled at me, and despite it being a very sweet gesture to have some time alone with me I knew that there was going to be an extensive conversation about something. We had been dating for years and it was rare for us to have time alone and we had been completely fine with it, the only time he demanded time alone was when he had a serious conversation in mind, and even then Smalls occasionally joined in.

We let Kenny out outside his house and we took off. I had only seen Kenny's parents twice since I was here and the first time they weren't too sure who I was.

Couldn't blame them, we all loved Kenny's parents but they were a bit on the strict side of parenting, Kenny said that they liked us a lot but we did give them plenty of opportunities not to, like when we busted open Kenny's cast making him hit baseballs with it.

They clicked when they matched then name to the person and were super welcoming but since I hadn't seen them in a few years I was worried that my antics were still fresh in their mind.

Benny turned avoiding town, "What the heck are you doing? Town is that way."

"I know." He said simply.

"Then where- Benny are you insane?"

"What?"

I recognized the houses as we turned again. "We can't go to my house."

"Well we can't go to Kenny's and I want to be alone with you."

"Why do you insist on doing this? Every time there is even the slightest chance of getting caught, we get caught."

He smiled at me, "It makes it more fun."

"Benny, we are not going in that house, Clara-"

"Clara went out of town for two days."

"How in the world do you know that?"

"Because when I was picking you up today she had a suitcase with her and a blonde woman was picking her up. Plus I saw the note on your door this morning."

"Clara left a note for me?"

"No, for the mailman. It says not to bring the paper for the next two days because she's gone."

I rolled my eyes at that, Clara and I didn't speak and it's not like she bragged about me around town being her step daughter but I would think she would at least mention she was disappearing

for two days. Then again maybe not.

She had a habit of doing this kind of thing, we fight something happens and I don't really see her for a few days, kind of her way of getting out of it I guess.

"You didn't mention it?"

Benny shrugged. "I thought you knew until you started yelling at me."

"I wasn't yelling."

Benny only smiled, his smile meant that he knew that he had won whatever kind of encounter this was, my attitude had disappeared and to him that was a win.

When we walked into the house, Clara indeed wasn't there, and there were no notes anywhere to indicate that she was missing.

"Maybe you should report that she ran away." Benny joked as we entered the kitchen.

"I'm not getting into anymore trouble with the police."

"You're hiding a fugitive at this very moment."

"Will you stop it with that? You're not a fugitive, the police aren't even looking for you anymore. What did your parents say when they heard about that anyways?"

Benny gave me a quizzical look. "You think I told them?"

"I thought they might understand considering they know how insane Clara is."

"Well, I didn't tell them, no need to really, its not like the poise showed up at my door looking for me." I shoved him away from the fridge he was blocking, he laughed as I rummaged through the fridge.

"What do you want to eat?" I asked changing the subject.

"I'll eat whatever you make."

"Wait what? You're not going to help me?"

"No?"

"You take me to my house instead of out, just so I can cook?"

Benny took a seat at the kitchen table his grin never faltering. "I took you here to be alone. But this is _your_ house and I am the guest."

"You're a terrible boyfriend." I wasn't too sure what to make, considering there was rarely food in my house I could usually get quite creative, but with Clara being on this perfect mother stride, there was actual choice, and it was hard to make one with so much choice.

"You still like burnt toast?'

"You're making me toast?" I threw the bread back in the cabinet deciding it wasn't the best choice. "I'm not judging I was just asking." He laughed.

"I'll make mac and cheese."

"Fancy." I ignored him and attempted to measure out the macaroni into a pot before beginning to grate cheese, it had been about a minute of preparation when I felt Benny's arms slip around my waist, and his hot breath on my neck.

"What are you doing?" His response was the press of his lips along my neck, and fingers slipping under my shirt to stroke my stomach. "Cooking turning you on?"

He smiled into my neck and continued his assault, as much as I was enjoying his advances I shouldered him away from my neck. "You can't just force me to cook for you and then distract me."

He turned me around, ignoring me and leaned down to kiss me, tongue snaking its way into my mouth, fingers burning my skin, and body hard as he pressed me against the counter.

"Mmmmm." Benny groaned into my mouth as my hands slid up his chest and into his hair.

"Do you want to eat or not?" I asked against his lips.

"Hmm, mac and cheese isn't really what I'm hungry for." His kisses were demanding, needy, and absolutely perfect.

Quickly I gave in, the food forgotten temporarily as his hands slid along my hips and found the warmth of my back beneath my shirt, his strong body holding my in place as his lips trailed down my neck to my collar bone and pushing away the fabric of my shift from my shoulder.

"You know you're just proving Clara right by attacking me in my kitchen." I joked, a breathy sigh escaping my lips as he worked his magic on my skin.

"Shut up." He muttered before crushing his lips against mine.

And just like that we were rushing, our shirts forgotten on the floor, belt undone and hands griping at anything we could get ahold of.

Benny's hands wrapped around my thighs pulling me up to him so I could wrap my legs around his wast.

His lips broke from mine to attack my throat again, my hands tangled in his hair as he carried me up the stairs and into my bedroom.

"You know." Benny said as he dropped me on my bed, crawling on top of me. "This time theres no one we have to worry about interrupting. We can take our time." He whispered huskily into my lips as he kissed me again.

"That's why it was so fast last time." I joked with him, "You were rushing?" Benny shot up to a seated position glaring down at me.

"What a terrible thing to say to your boyfriend. You know I could just leave." His smile and his ranging teenage hormones told me that he wasn't going anywhere.

"Come here." I laughed pulling him down by his neck to meet my lips once again.

But Benny was right this time there was absolutely no risk of someone walking in on us, and we took _full_ advantage of it.


	17. Chapter 17

I could tell that the coaches were starting to regret their decisions, the rest of the boys that were left were too good of friends and they were starting the be way too immature.

They gossiped, they didn't pay attention, they joked around, they weren't trying, and they were taking the tryouts too lightly.

Well, really they weren't at tryouts at the moment, the week was being dedicated to practice and prep for the tournament this weekend.

"Toni, can I talk to you?" It was coach O'Niall, I stopped picking up the balls and placing them in the bucket and followed him to the dugout.

The boys were practicing by playing pepper, at least that's what they were supposed to be doing.

"I have an idea."

'Okay." I said.

"The boys all think that they're safe and they're not working hard, I need kids that work hard."

"Well." I started. "Only about five of them are doing what they're supposed to, you can't cut all of them and only keep five."

He shook his head. "No, they need a challenge. I'm going to tell that that you're going to pitch in the tournament."

That took me off guard. "What? I thought I couldn't play?"

"Technically it's not against the rules for you to play but it will cause a lot of problems if you did. I'm just going to tell them that you're gonna play, to get them to take this seriously."

"And you need me to do that?"

"They know you're a good player but they don't take it seriously because they know you're just an assistant. If I tell them you're going to play it may light a fire under their ass'. I need you to play along. You're gonna practice and make it seem like you're gearing up for the game and we'll see if that makes them work."

I knew what he was doing, and it was very smart in my opinion, these guys weren't trying and the second they thought their place might be taken not only by another person, but a girl no less they would be working harder.

It was going to help me too, all week these boys had been throwing towels at me, demanding water and kicking dirt in my face, maybe showing them up might get a little more respect.

"Coach, you _just_ demented me a week ago, you really think they're going to believe that you're putting me on the team?"

"They will if you are practicing with us each day, are you okay with this?" I nodded. "Alright grab your mitt." I snatched it up off the bench and followed him towards the mound. "Alright boys bring it in!" A herd of boys came jogging in from the field and made a semi circle around us, not a single one was sweating or out of breath. "Boys. Meet your new pitcher." Coach O'Niall patted me on the shoulder as I twisted my fist in my glove, it was an awkward moment. Some of them were confused and other caught on right away and were now twisted with anger.

"Are you kidding me?" Greg asked.

"I am not kidding you, Toni is going to pitch the first game of the tournament."

"What why?" Someone demanded.

"Because you boys act like this tournament is nothing, like you already have earned your spot and you all haven't earned anything. Sulkin, get your gear on, catch a bullpen."

Sulkin, whose first name was Terry shook his head. "No way, I ain't catching for her, I'll catch for the actual members of the team."

"Then you won't be catching at all in the tournament, and if you don't catch I can't take you on the team as a catcher." Terry glared, but stayed firm on his choice.

"Fine, Logan, get your gear."

"No." Coach O'Niall actually seemed surprised when the second boy refused to catch for me.

"I ain't gonna hurt you." I teased.

"You can't just throw a girl on the team, we all worked hard to get to this point in the tryouts and you ain't going to embarrass us by putting her in the spot light." He snapped spitting on the floor.

Coach O'Niall took a step towards the boys. "Maybe if You all will get your damn heads out of your asses, I wouldn't have to put her in."

Cole K. Piped up then. "You can't bench all of us." He reminded. "You want us to become a team? Well this team is gonna stick together and you can't bench all of us, if she plays none of us

play." He crossed his arms, making a choice for the whole team, one that was not going to fly with a few people on the team.

"Who the hell are you speaking for?" Kenny's voice demanded as he pushed his way to the front of the boys to get in Cole's face.

"I'm speaking for the team."

"You ain't on the team yet you idiot. And frankly you don't speak for all of us because I think it's awesome that she's going to pitch the first game, Lord knows all the rest of you suck."

Parker snapped at him. "You're a pitcher Kenny, she's taking your position what does that say about you?"

"I've known her since we were kids and she's always been a better pitcher than me, even helped me with some of my technique. I can own up to it."

"Yeah well you still can't make a team with only two people."

"We've got three." Benny made his way to stand next to Kenny.

There was a moment of silence before Parker spoke up again. "Well of course you stand up for her, she sucks your dick at night!"

"HEY!" Kenny and Benny yelled at the same time nearly jumping on the boy before they realized where they were and that fighting would get them thrown out of here faster then Ham with a comeback.

"Enough!" Coach O'Niall snapped. "I know that you all aren't going to stand up to this little pack you're trying to make because you all aren't a team, and you'd all stab each other in the back if it meant you had a chance to play for a major league team. So, this is whats going to happen, anyone who is willing to stay and deal with my choices and work towards their goals then get the hell on the field. Anyone who doesn't want to, and can't handle Toni pitching in a game then get the hell out and I will personally make sure that every single one of you never make it on a major league field let alone a college team. Got it?"

There was a moment of hesitation before the boys slowly began to take their positions on the field, and Cole moved to get his gear on.

"Give them hell." Adam said hitting me on the shoulder.

"Alright, lets see what you've got." Coach O'Niall said slapping the ball into my hand.

Standing on the mound was like being home, I just wished it was Ham that was behind the plate. It felt different, I was standing on a regulation field and we actually had a pitching rubber rather than a stick dug into the dirt, but it was somehow all the same.

Cole raised his glove giving me a target as well as a signal which happened to be his middle finger.

Fastball it was.

I wound up, and let the ball fly.

The crack of leather on leather was heard as the ball made contact with Cole's premium catchers glove.

"Holy shit." Adam said. "You didn't say she could throw like that!"

Ten pitches in, fastball, curveball, riseball, change up, knuckle, and drop balls were thrown, I was about to go again when someone stopped me.

"Hold on, Hold on." Coach O'Niall immediately came running towards the mound, he rubbed his chin, looking at the boys in the field before looking down at me. "Who taught you to throw like that?" He was whispering, so as not to be heard.

"I played on a team when I was really young, but I told you I played sandlot ball since I was twelve."

"No one learns to play that well on a sandlot." I furrowed my brow in confusion.

"Benny learned how to bat from playing sandlot ball."

"Who taught you how to throw?" He asked again.

"No one." He looked distressed. "Is there a problem?"

Coach O'Niall sighed and rubbed his sunburnt face. "How fast are you?" He asked.

"I don't know."

"Toni-"

"I don't, we couldn't even afford to play on a real field, do you really think we could afford a radar gun? What is the problem anyways, you knew I pitched."

"The problem is Toni, that I am supposed to pull you in a few weeks when they start to pull their weight. I can't do that if they don't rise to your level." I understood.

I was at their level if not better, and it was a problem, how was he going to pull me when I was better? How could he possibly not look like a complete idiot? They would know it was all a plan, and they would get pissed, even more pissed then they were now.

I looked around at the boys who were all staring and desperately trying to hear the conversation.

"I can't play down. I can't lower my skill level." And it was true, I didn't know how. I had thrown the ball to Alexis, Yeah Yeah's little sister a few times, and I quickly found out that my level went from tossing the ball 20 mph to striking out Benny, there was no inbetween.

I had tried, I tried really hard when Smalls was trying to get better but by trying to throw slower, I was a mess, I couldn't hit targets, the ball didn't even make it over the plate.

O'Niall looked angry, angry and frustrated with a plan that he came up with, he must have thought I wasn't as good as I made myself out to be. "I'll figure it out, for now no more throwing?

You got it? And do not throw to these boys, do you understand?" I did.

I nodded. "Okay."

He turned away from me and announced to the boys. "You all have got some serious work to do if you want to play in the tournament."

As I watched him walk away, I pulled my glove off and left the mound. I wasn't sure why I was upset. I couldn't tell if it was because I knew I wasn't gong to play in the tournament, or because I knew I may _never_ play again.


	18. Chapter 18

Benny, Kenny and I were sitting in the diner, both Benny and Kenny were upholding the conversation well enough without me.

Benny slammed his water on the table. "I'm serious." I rolled my eyes.

"I am too." Kenny said.

I rolled my eyes. "You guys aren't going to do anything. Cause if you do you'll be kicked off the team."

"They've been tormenting you for days."

" _Two days._ " I reminded him, the Tournament was on Saturday, it was Thursday. "And I'd hardly call it torture." The boys on the team hadn't been very nice to me, nothing new, but they were being bigger assholes than usual. Tipping over the buckets of balls, stepping on the raked field at the end of the day, pushing over the gatorade I pour, Terry even filled my helmet full of dirt before I base ran so they could run some pickoffs.

Nothing I couldn't handle.

"They're jerks." Benny frowned.

"Exactly, and there is nothing thats going to change that. It's one more day, it'll be fine." And it would be, I wouldn't admit it to them but the boys _were_ driving me insane, but I wasn't about

to blow my top again after spitting on Adam.

Kenny and Benny knew the plan, of course they did, I told them everything, and they thought it was really stupid.

"He should just let you play." Kenny took a bite out of his burger.

"Oh yeah, then they'd really hate me."

"But at least you'd be playing ball again." It wasn't worth it, it really wasn't, these boys were fighting for a spot on a team that was going to possibly get them a chance to play in the majors. I

wasn't about to go and take a spot from them when there was no chance of me even making it past the college team.

Coach O'Niall was clear about where I stood anyways, I was a good helping hand but I wasn't going to play.

"Come on we gotta go." Benny said jumping out of the booth and taking my hand.

"Where?" I asked.

"The field. Were you even listening to us?" I wasn't.

"Leave the boys alone." I sighed.

"We're not going to mess with them, we're going to practice."

"On the field I just finished maintaining?"

Benny laughed throwing some money on the table. "We'll help you clean up, come on."

The field was already in use, a few of the boys were on the field practicing, either they had the same idea as Benny and Kenny to get some extra practice, or they wanted to piss me off by making a mess. Either way they were hitting balls.

"Oh fuck off!" Terry's voice came from the field.

"I assume he's talking to me." I said, Benny was angry but kept his mouth shut.

"We're here to practice. Same as you." Kenny said putting on his mitt.

"What does she need to practice for? Thought you were perfect the way you are." Cole K yelled.

Benny made his way onto the field us following him. "She is, which is why she's playing over you assholes."

"Listen Rodriguez, I get that she's the one that spreads her legs for you, but that don't mean she's any better than us." Benny's fists clenched but he managed to keep his tone calm.

"The coach seems to think she is."

"Yeah, she spreading her legs for him too?" Kenny had to pull Benny back to keep him from jumping on the boy.

"Benny let it go." I said stepping in front of him. "Nothing but a bunch of Phillips'" Benny visible released but I knew inside he was fuming. I looked over my shoulder at them. "I don't need to have sex to get a spot in the tournament, you might wanna try it though."

"You're a real bitch you know that?" Greg snapped.

"Why? Cause I'm a better player than you guys?"

"You're not better than us." Cole said. "You have something between your legs we don't."

"You sure about that?" I laughed. "Cause I was wondering how you made it this far." I turned back to Benny and Kenny then. "Come on lets just go." I didn't see Parker, I didn't even hear him come up behind me but I did feel the cold of water before my head and by back was soaked.

"What the hell is your guys problem?!" Kenny yelled at them. "Sunshine didn't ask to be a helper on the team, she didn't ask to help evaluate, she didn't ask to be part of the tryouts and she didn't ask to be put in the tournament!"

"Kenny-"

"Are you all really this sexist?"

"We like girls fine Kenny." Cole K said crossing his arms in annoyance, he didn't like being called sexist, none of them did.

"As what? As cheerleaders, you guys are either so ignorant that you think she can't play as well as you, or you're so threatened by her that you are messing with her, so which is it?"

Greg narrowed his eyes. "We're not jealous, and we're not sexist?"

"Then what? I don't see you guys messing with me when I'm the one that has a spot on the team already, I don't see you pouring water on my head because I can throw a heater and you can't,

what is your problem?"

They were getting pissed off, they may not have a problem with Kenny but they didn't like being called sexist, and they didn't like him calling them out on their shit.

"You would accept her if she was a cheerleader you would accept her if she was just Benny's girlfriend and you would accept her if she was baking cupcakes to raise money for our tournament, why can't you respect her as a baseball player?"

They were silent, each trying to think of the best approach to answering him, a good majority of these boys had girlfriends, I had seen them with them multiple times and they had even come to the tryouts before, they couldn't say anything about me that wouldn't apply to their own girls.

"We just don't like her." Parker finally said.

"Then quit using her gender as an argument." Benny piped up, his hands had unclenched.

Parker glared at Benny. "It don't matter what her gender is Benny, she ain't better than us."

"Prove it." the words were out of my mouth before I knew what to do.

"What?"

I was sick of it, in about ten minutes these boys had managed to get me from not caring, to raging angry. I tried to keep my cool, and I tried to be civil but I was mad. They were going to tease me after the tournament, talk about how I wasn't as good as I thought I was because I got pulled last minute, it was a recipe for torment.

"I said prove it. Prove you ain't better than me." I needed them to shut up, baseball was the one thing I loved and was good at, and if I wasn't playing then I needed to have a somewhat positive environment, respect was what I needed.

"What you want us to have some kind of pitching competition."

"Hit off me." I said. "I bet I can strike you out." The boys scoffed and laughed at that. I knew that Coach O'Niall told me not to throw to them, but I was beyond doing what I was told. I wanted to get respect and this was the way I was going to do it.

"We ain't hitting off you, you'd sooner hit us than strike us out." Cole snapped, he was worried I could see it in his eyes.

I straightened my shoulders and wiped at a bead of water sliding down my cheek. "I'll make it interesting then. Pick who you want, one of you or all of you I don't care. I strike you out you back the hell off, you never say another word about me and you leave me the hell alone. You hit off me, I'll pull out of the tournament, I'll even tell O'Niall I'm too scared to pitch against the boys in the league."

I knew there was a chance they were going to hit off me, but I had been evaluating them for weeks, I knew what they had trouble hitting and I knew that they would be on edge having to hit

off me, the odds were in my favour, I just hoped they didn't know that.

They didn't even think about it before they were moving to get their bats and helmets.

"Hey Toni." Kenny said pulling me to the side. "You sure about this?"

"Yeah why not?"

Kenny looked distraught not wanting to make me nervous but also wanting to tell me the truth. "You're a great pitcher, don't get me wrong but these kids aren't kids from Phillips team.

They're good, and you haven't practiced in a while."

"You don't think I can do it?"

He quickly back tracked, "No I do, I really do think you can do it. But thats six guys you have to strike out, and they're talented. They have been playing their entire lives like you and me, they know how to hit."

I thought about what he said, and he was right, they wouldn't be here if they weren't good players and the hardest challenge I ever had was Benny. Benny was phenomenal, but that didn't mean that he was the best, the boys could hit too.

"I'm gonna do it, either way they're not going to shut up unless I do something."

"Alright, kick some ass then."

Cole K was easy, the kid couldn't hit a curve ball to save his life and everyone knew it, even him. I tricked him, he thought I was going to throw a curve the very first pitch but I threw a screw ball. It looked like it was going to hit him and he quickly jumped out of the box just before it broke and went to Benny's glove.

Benny had offered to catch to keep from telling the players what pitch was coming.

"Fuck you!" Cole snapped at me before stepping back in the box. Two curves later and he was out.

Parker was up next, Parker was a really good hitter, almost as good as Benny in my mind and I knew he would be my toughest challenge. If I could strike him out the rest of the boys would be easy.

One thing I did notice about parker was that he had an issue with his ego, he hated having to choke up on the bat against faster pitchers. I looked down at the ball, it had been a while since I had thrown a wringer.

I took a deep breath and waited as Benny went through every pitch, every single one I shook off. Benny stood and took off the mask giving me a quizzical look, before jogging over to the mound.

"What do you want to throw?" he asked.

"You know what I want to throw."

"Wringer? You haven't thrown it in a while though, you sure you're gonna be able to do it?" It was a pitch that wasn't very forgiving, teaching it to Kenny had been hell, it was like the knuckle ball you didn't really know where it was gonna go, you just threw it and hoped for the best.

"Yeah." I said.

Benny looked unconvinced but agreed anyways before heading back behind the plate. He actually bothered to give me the signal for it. Three, one, two, two.

I didn't even think about it as I let the ball fly, and heard the satisfying crack of leather as Benny caught the ball. Parker didn't even swing.

"Dude you didn't even swing!" Greg yelled to him.

"Shut up!" He snapped back. "I'm just seeing how she throws."

"101." A voice came from above the plate.

"What?" greg yelled up. Behind the plate was the announcers booth where people sat to announce the starting lineups and set the scoreboard.

A little kids head popped up in view. "101." He yelled out.

"Bullshit!" Parker yelled up to him. Parker looked back at me. "Thats my kid brother, I forgot he was up there working the radar gun. He's full of shit."

"I'm not lying." He sang from the booth. "She threw 101, been averaging out at 94 or so since then."

"Shut up Finn!" Parker snapped. "Throw the damn ball." He snapped at me as Benny tossed the ball back.

101? 101 miles per hour? Thats how fast I threw it? Or was the kid actually full of shit trying to mess with his brother?

In that moment I had to know, Benny gave me every signal again hoping for something other than the Wringer, but I had to do it, I had to, I had to know if I could throw a 100 mile per hour

fast ball.

Reluctantly Benny gave me the signal. Three, one, two, two.

I don't know what happened then, I remember throwing the ball, but It was like it slipped from my hand and ant flying well behind Parker and into the backstop. And then pain, searing,

burning, gruelling pain.

I think I screamed, I'm not sure, but I did jump a few times, my arm like rubber swaying as I did before I collapsed onto the dirt.

"Toni? Toni? Are you okay?" Benny asked falling next to me. It was a stupid question but I couldn't tell him how stupid a question it was because I couldn't speak through the pain.

My right elbow was shooting pain up my shoulder and my neck.

"Toni! Breathe!" Benny pleaded trying to help sit me up, but I couldn't move, I held my arm and cried out in pain.

Benny picked my withering body and ran me to his truck, Kenny and a confused and shocked group of boys following closely behind.

Once I was in the passenger seat of the car was when the tears began to flow.

It wasn't from the pain, it was from the realization. It had happened, the worst thing that could happen to a pitcher, the worst thing that could happen to a baseball player. I turned to Benny and through my tears and gritted teeth I made it all real.

"I just threw my arm out."


	19. Chapter 19

I didn't mind hospitals, some people hated them but I didn't find them that bad. The last time I had been in one was when I had broken my ankle and even at the age of twelve I didn't mind them.

The only thing I didn't like was that Clara had shown up.

"What did you do?" She demanded storming through the door.

"Who let you in?" I asked rolling my eyes.

"What did you do?" She asked again not even hearing me.

"Why do you assume I did something? Maybe I got hit by a car." She stared at me with those cold eyes, demanding an answer from me. I couldn't tell her that I hurt it playing ball, she would

have a field day with it. "I went to pick up something, it was heavier than I thought it was and tore my arm up."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"Well it's the story I'm sticking to." I snapped back at her, the amount of pain I was in coupled with her presence was not helping my attitude with her. "Seriously how did you get back here?"

I had specifically asked for Benny and Kenny, and demanded that Clara not be allowed back.

"I am your guardian."

"Like that means anything why are you even here? I figured you'd only show up to identify my body and sing while you did it." She glared at me.

"Will you shut up?!" She hissed. "People can hear you."

"I hope they can!" I yelled out earning a glare and a perfectly manicured hand over my mouth. It tasted like perfume and fake leather.

"Don't touch me!" I snarled pushing her hand away with my left arm. Raising my right hurt too much, it was in a sling against my chest and hurt like hell.

"Tell me what is going on!" Clara wasn't stupid, she knew I had done it playing baseball but I wasn't' going to give her the satisfaction of confirming it. I had X rays done before she arrived

and the doctor said it would be a little bit before she came back, they told me I wasn't allowed visitors yet when I asked for Kenny and Benny but apparently Clara was an exception.

I had to tell Clara something, at least then she would shut up about it and maybe even leave. "I had X rays done on my arm, that's all I know, that and that it hurts."

"Is it broken?" She genuinely sounded curious, not concerned but curious.

"No."

She scoffed, "How would you know?"

I rolled my eyes at her. "Because I've broken a bone before, remember? My ankle?"

"Oh I remember! I remember the bill for the cast. . . ." She trailed and her gaze became hard again. "How much is this going to cost?

"Do you actually think I know the answer to that?"

Clara opened her mouth to argue with me when the doctor came in, it was now time for her mother of the year act. "Oh thank goodness. Is she alright?"

"Well she's going to live." Doctor Doon said trying to lightening up the obvious tense air in the room. "But I do have some bad news."

"Oh no, what is it?" I had to give it to Clara she was one hell of an actress, though it was easy to be fake around people you didn't know.

"Your daughter-"

I cut her off. "Step daughter."

"Right, anyways, Toni you ripped your tendon."

"I did what?"

Doctor Doon sighed and placed the X ray on light up board to show me. "This is your MRI." Oh I guess it wasn't an X-ray. "See this, that's your tendon, it's torn here and-" I really wasn't listening to her, all I could see on the picture was shapes and colours I didn't know what any of it meant.

Clara sighed in fake relief. "So she'll be okay?"

"In time, but Toni you have to rest your arm okay? And I'll give you some medication for the pain."

"How long?" I eagerly asked.

"Tendons take a long time to heal, and they vary-"

"How long?" I asked again more forceful this time. The Doctor sighed and turned off the light board and took the picture down.

"I don't know Toni, a while, it could be weeks, it could be months, some people take years to be back to where they used to be."

I nearly choked. " _Years?_ What. . . what about-" I couldn't finish with Clara looking at me the way she was, a look of concern and anger she wanted me to spill that I had been playing baseball, that I had done this to myself but I couldn't do it.

"Clara get out." I told her.

"Excuse me?"

I said it again. "Get out. I don't want you in here." I was getting worked up and I knew my attitude would just seem like a bratty teenager that didn't want to talk to her step mom but I needed to know the answer to my question.

"Actually it may be better if you stepped out. You can come see her later." Dr. Doon said and Clara flashed her a smile before heading out the door.

I turned on the Doctor right then. "How long before I can play ball again?"

"I need to discuss that with you. Toni, pitching is what did this to you, you put so much strain on your arm that you tendon ripped. Were there any signs telling you that something was wrong?" I thought back to all the times Benny screamed at me for pitching when my arm hurt, the amount of times he made me sit out of a game and ice my arm, and the countless times I told him it didn't hurt when it did.

"No." I lied.

She knew I was lying. "Toni everyone is built differently what one person can handle may not be what another person can."

"What's your point?" I was being a bitch I knew it but I was too frustrated to listen to a lecture and get a lesson on human anatomy.

"The healing process is slow, but Odds are even after it's over you won't be able to pitch again."

I felt nauseous, my stomach had dropped down to my feet and made them go numb, my mouth was dry and a pain built up in the back of my throat. Tears, the tears were building up and I had to swallow them down like when you swallow a pill dry. "What?"

"You can play baseball just not at the intensity you usually do. If you throw you'll be putting strain on it again and you'll cause more problems, on top of that it's going to hurt."

"But I'll eventually be one hundred percent better right?"

She sighed. "Toni, your one hundred percent caused this injury. I'm sorry but if you chose to play it's going to hurt and possibly cause more damage and just physiologically you're not going to be able to perform at your regular level, the body won't allow it."

The tears moved to my eyes and threatened to fall. "tell me you're lying."

"I'm sorry, I'm not." She was being sincere and she was being nice but I couldn't help the words that came out of my mouth.

"Fuck off!" It came out along with a river of tears."

"Toni-"

"Get the fuck out!" I wasn't going to be able to play this summer, no one knew how long I was going to be out for, but even when I healed I wasn't going to be able to pitch anymore. I wasn't going to be able to do the one thing I loved to do, the one thing that I was actually good at.

I had spent years hiding it from my dad, I snuck out, took abuse for it and did everything in my power to make sure I even got 10 minutes on the field.

I lost my fucking father for the game, and it was just ripped away from me.

I lost my chance to play the sport I loved, and my last time playing was trying to strike out a bunch of jerks, not even playing with my friends on the sandlot.

I had been sobbing, wracking my body with cries of despair and anguish, I knew the other patients and staff could hear me but no one came in to check on me. They knew they were the cries of a girl who was devastated and was not going cheer up with some consoling.

My life had been taken from me.

Benny didn't know what to say, neither did Kenny but at least Benny was keeping quite about it.

"Well you don't know for sure." I didn't say anything, Benny was holding my hand and giving me a saddened look, the kind of look that told me he understood the despair I was going

through. "I mean, you could heal in two weeks and be better right?"

"Kenny-"

"I'm just saying look on the positive side." Kenny was a glass half full kind of person, he was the person I called when things sucked and I needed someone to make the world seem like it wasn't so shit. Benny did a good job of it just by being there but Benny was practical, Kenny was ignorant and times, sometimes it was the best thing.

"We told the boys." Benny said sort of changing the subject. "I think Ham cried."

I breathed out a laugh. "No he didn't."

"No he didn't." He admitted with a small smile. "But he did swear a lot, Smalls might have cried, he's been emotional lately."

"Isn't he at school by now? Early admittance."

"Nah he's still got two weeks, but Timmy said he's been watching romance movies and is going all soft."

"Smalls can get softer?"

Benny smiled a little wider, having information that he knew would make me feel a little better. "He has a new girlfriend."

My brow furrowed but I smiled. "Before he goes off to school?"

"Well I guess she's not a _girlfriend_ but he has been seeing her for a little while, doesn't know what he's gonna do when he's off at school. Apparently she really likes going to the movies and takes him along. It's summer a lot of summer romance movies out." I nodded in agreement, Kenny looked like he was going to jump out of his skin from excitement.

suddenly he burst. "Smalls had sex."

"What?" I nearly choked on my own spit when he said that. "No he didn't."

"He did! He told us!"

"He told you?"

"He tells Benny everything." I turned to look at Benny who shrugged.

Benny squeezed my hand "It happened a few days ago I guess. He wasn't really the one to tell me, Squints was, apparently she's okay friends with Wendy and she told her before he could tell the boys."

"What's her name?"

"Terah. Apparently nothing like Haley." Thank the lord, but Smalls having sex? It was weird to think about, he was so shy around girls, I would think it would be a while before he lost his virginity, I mean I guess I shouldn't be surprised but it was Smalls. The awkward and fidgety little boy we met was now having sex? Jesus.

"Is Clara gonna come back?" Kenny asked looking over his shoulder at the door way from his seat on my bed.

"You're the ones that told me she left."

"She did, but we don't know if she's coming back." I doubted it, she saw me, she pretended to be concerned and now I was sure she was gossiping with her friends.

"I doubt she'll be back."

"When can you leave this place? It's creepy here."

I sighed and shrugged. "They said at the end of the day, maybe I'm hoping so, I don't like just sitting here."

There was silence between the three of us, I could tell that Benny wanted to ask me something but didn't know how to. "What?" I asked looking at his handsome and concerned face.

"Have you thought about how to tell Coach?"

"I just figured if I showed up with this fucking sling then that would be enough."

"It probably will be." He agreed. "Think he'll be made."

"I don't really care what he'll be." And I didn't, if he was mad, I didn't care, if he was relieved I didn't care, the only thing I cared about was being able to play ball again.

"You know." Kenny said getting off the bed. "I think Clara is a racist."

Benny and I looked at one another. "Where the hell did that come from?" Benny asked.

"Well you know, she says all those things about you Benny."

"I don't think she's racist." I said. "Honestly I think she just says those things to piss me off and make Benny feel less of a person."

Kenny rolled his eyes. "That's racism."

"Maybe, but she doesn't say anything about anyone else, never said anything about you." Clara had a lot of things about her, and even though she treated Benny like a dog she never did say anything about anyone else.

"You can hate one race and not hate another."

"You're saying she hates Mexicans then?"

Benny narrowed his eyes at me playfully. "I'm not just Mexican."

"Fine, but you think she hates all the many different spanish speaking races?"

"Maybe."

I looked at Kenny carefully, he didn't look mad, he had encountered racism in his life as well, and he never really got too mad about it. He didn't look mad, but he looked intrigued.

"What does this have to do with anything?"

Kenny shrugged leaning over the front of my bed. "Look I know the Valley had very little racism because everyone has been there for years but this place is a little different. People can be racist but it doesn't sit well."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning, in the Valley everyone just assumes no one is racist, and no one says anything because they don't have anyone to discuss their opinions with. _Here_ , people are racist and its happened a couple times, and when it did, jesus those people were all but castrated."

"Kenny, get to your point." Benny said.

"Look Clara is your biggest obstacle here right?" I nodded. "If we can get her to say something openly racist in front of people then you're gonna have a really easy time here. She'll be hated, and all the allegations she has on Benny will just be seen as her being racist."

"So you want to expose her as racist to get these allegations taken off of Benny?"

Kenny nodded. I trusted Kenny, I would trust him with my life but he wasn't the idea person on our team growing up. Sure Clara was a bitch, but did she really deserve to be labeled and tormented in this town? Maybe, but I still didn't want to be the one to be behind exposing someone for something they're not.

"I don't wanna do it." Benny said standing up from his chair beside my bed. "We can't ruin Clara's life without ruining Toni's. Plus," He looked down at me then back to Kenny. "I'm not really in on ruining someones life, Clara will get whats coming to her, and as things are right now, I'd rather not mess it up."

Benny was right, things were good at the moment, Clara wasn't really in my business, and she didn't even know Benny was here and the cops cure as hell weren't even looking for him anymore. "She'll be eighteen in a few weeks, it's not like Clara has any say on how she'll live her life then."

"Benny's right Kenny, I can stick it out for a few weeks. Thanks for caring so much though." Kenny didn't look disappointed but he did look a bit surprised.

"Alright."

I pushed myself up in the bed sitting up straighter. "The only thing I'm concerned about it this stupid thing." I pointed to the sling. "Any ideas on this?"

Benny thought about it for a second. "Ever thought about learning to pitch left handed?"

I scoffed. "How easy do you think that is to do?"

"Well you switch hit."

"Since I was a little kid Benny, I'm not gonna learn how to pitch opposite hand in a few weeks."

Kenny agreed. "Yeah, besides she might even screw up her other arm."

"Kenny shut up." Benny rolled his eyes. "It's worth a shot, either that or you're benched." Benny didn't mean to sound as cold as he did, and at the look in my eyes he immediately back tracked. "I'm sorry, it's just baseball isn't a sport where you kinda need an arm Toni."

"Well." Kenny said getting our attention. "Not necessarily." I tried to figure out what in the world was going through Kenny's head, but I couldn't think of a single position where you didn't have to throw the ball.


	20. Chapter 20

"Benny The Jet Rodriguez." Benny read before thrusting the slip of paper back at me. "You can't put that on the line up."

"Why not?" I asked taking it back.

"They'll announce me as that, and I don't want to give those guys anymore reason to hate me."

"They've been a lot nicer." And it was true ever since I showed up yesterday with the sling and a hard to swallow explanation they had been very nice to Benny at practice, accepting him as one of their own. Benny's girlfriend was no longer a threat to their positions.

"For a day, and they'll just go back to hating me if you put this on here." he said tapping the lineup in my hand.

I rolled my eyes and stuffed it into my pocket. "You know Greg made me put his nickname on here." He gave me a quizzical look. "The Great."

"Who calls him that?"

"No one."

Benny's first game on a team other than the Sandlot was in two hours and I could tell that he was nervous, heck, I was nervous for him. Baseball was what Benny did, it was who he was but he hadn't played against anyone good before, you couldn't say that playing 4 on 5 was a real game, and Phillips team sucked, it was his real first challenge.

I knew he would do well, but the look in his eyes left me wondering if he knew it as well. Benny was a humble person, he and been humble since we were kids, always knowing there was room for improvement and that worried me a little bit.

Baseball was about confidence, I mean look at Smalls, he couldn't catch until it was proved that he could, and then his baseball skills made a complete 180.

He needed to go out there knowing how good he was, and knowing that he could hit off any pitcher.

"You know." Benny started touching the material of my sling. "I really wish you were playing today."

"Me too." I said jiggling my arm around in its cage.

Benny smiled. "No I mean, not just today, you're an amazing ball player and it freaking kills me to know that you're on the sidelines because you're a girl."

"There's nothing we can do about that Benny, I know I'm a good player and I don't think less of myself because of my gender, there's no point in dwelling on it."

Benny smiled but I knew he was only doing it to make me feel more comfortable, he was upset that I wasn't playing ball but I knew that was the deal when I took the job with this team.

I think that Benny's anger about the situation came more from the fact that he wasn't playing with the sandlot boys. All he had left was Kenny, and I was here but not playing and I think it

really got to him. He had to play ball with these boys he didn't know and didn't really like all that much, and here I was on the sidelines rather than enjoying the game with him.

The first 2 innings went fast. Too fast, the team we were playing were called the Hurricane's and it was obvious that they had their team complete because they were good, really good. They went three up three down, and shut us down quickly. The fortunate part for us was that we still had the excuse that we were still making cuts. O'Niall had done his best to make a lineup that would benefit us as well as it could but he had chosen someone who was not a leader off hitter as lead off and it sent to tone for the rest of the game.

Benny was placed 7th in the order, something I didn't agree with because he was a clean up hitter, and he needed to be placed where there was a possibility of someone being put on base to bring in.

"Rodriguez, you're up." I called as the boys came running back into the dugout. He knew he was up because he already had his helmet on since he sat the last inning.

Benny went to the plate and took his stance waiting for the pitcher to receive his signal.

I watched the pitcher, he was an excellent pitcher, but he had a tell sign, some pitcher had them but his was obvious to someone who was paying attention. When he was going to throw a fastball his pause was shorter than usual. When he was going to throw a change up, his glove was placed completely against his face as if trying to hide the way he was changing his grip.

Fastball was his first call, and I smirked knowing he didn't know who he was up against.

But something happened, Benny swung and missed.

It was all in my head but the world seemed to grow silent around me. Anyone who grew up with Benny knew that he crushed fastballs, it didn't matter who threw it, or how fast, he crushed them which is why he demanded that we rarely threw them to him.

But he missed. And by the time I was able to recognize what happened the second strike had been called on him.

I stood not knowing what was going on, thinking that if I stood at the fence then I would be able to see whatever magic the catcher had placed on Benny but there was nothing to see.

The third pitch came and I let my breath out when I heard the crack of his bat as he hit the ball. He took off running, letting everyone know why he was called the Jet, he rounded first ready to take second and we cheered. He was the first one to have actually made it on base and I was happy that his first at bat was going to be a double.

But something happened, Benny neared second and he slid into the dirt as the ball came flying to the second basemen, dust flew into the air creating a shield of the action from anyone watching.

"You're out!"

I had been assigned the task of scorekeeping, a stupid task since there was an official score keeper at each game that gave us the sheets at the end of the game to track our improvement but I assume it was just something for me to do while my arm was in a sling.

My pen nearly slipped from my grip as Benny came jogging back into the dugout covered in dust, and a look of defeat on his face.

"It's alright Benny." some of his teammates said as he walked past them to reclaim his spot on the bench.

Benny the Jet Rodriguez had been tagged out.

I had seen Benny get out before of course, but no one ever tagged him out. He was too fast, he was The Jet for a reason.

No one else seemed to understand the situation, there everyone was acting like it was no big deal and just telling him to shake it off. But there I was standing in the dugout, mouth hanging open in shock like a complete idiot.

It suddenly came to me, here Benny wasn't The Jet, he was just another kid playing baseball, in the Valley he was a legend, here he wasn't anything.

Yet.


	21. Chapter 21

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Clara demanded, in her hand she held about four pay stubs from the college.

I looked at her from the couch and rolled my eyes. "Snooping in my room I guess?"

"My house, my trash!"

"It's not trash, it was inside a notebook on my book shelf." Her anger wavered for a second, as if I had accused her of something and she wasn't prepared for it, but it soon was replaced with rage. "So why were you looking through them?"

"Why are you working for the school? What are you doing because I know you're not a teacher."

I couldn't help myself. "What? I don't have a teaching degree? Well don't tell the school that, they won't let me teach advanced physics anymore with a high school diploma."

The stubs left her hand as she threw them to the ground. "Don't get smart with me! Why are you working at the school?"

"It's not really any of your business. I'm out of the house longer, and I think we both know that the more time we spend away from each other the better."

There was a knock at the door and I prayed that it wasn't Benny, he knew to stay away from the house but he had been picking me up for the past couple days and Clara's car was in the shop for the day, so he wouldn't know she was home. I had hoped I'd be able to beat her to the door but she was already headed to answer it.

At the door was a tall handsome man in a suit, I would have thought he was a lawyer if it wasn't for the the way Clara was dressed.

I suddenly became very aware of the fact she was wearing a new dress, makeup including red lipstick and heels, the biggest giveaway was the missing ring on her left hand.

"You look amazing." The man said, he seemed nice enough, and I almost felt bad about making him so uncomfortable.

I snorted. "Wow."

Her head snapped towards me so quickly I thought she might had snapped her neck. "Shut your mouth."

"Look I know my dad isn't coming back, and he abandoned you, but you're still _married._ " The man looked confused but, and not just with my statement, but with even with just my presence.

"No I'm not." She said through gritted teeth.

"You want me to get your wedding ring and show him? How about your marriage license? Or the wedding pictures? Or even better all the bank statements with your conjoined account in my dad's name that you for some reason still use."

Her eyes were piercing, and it became apparent that she hadn't even lied and told him that she was divorced. "Who does he think I am?" I asked.

"I told you to shut up!" She hissed.

Ignoring her I directed my attention to the man at the door who was growing more and more uncomfortable as time went on. "Who did she tell you I was?"

"Uh, her foster kid."

"Well that's not a far stretch, but she's my stepmom. She was married to my dad for over ten years, _still_ married actually. He abandoned us, and she still thinks he's going to come back, once I'm eighteen. We had that argument last night, apparently he's just waiting for me to be old enough that he doesn't have to be responsible for me. Then he'll come back." I stood from the

couch, and headed towards the door, avoiding Clara and slipping past her date to stand on the porch. "But I guess until he does you guys can do whatever you want. And speaking of my dad I need to go to the police station, you know, keep up on where they think they saw him last. Last I heard he was somewhere in Europe. But have fun!"

I pushed past them I wanted to say more but I knew that I had caused enough trouble, besides Clara was an experienced liar, she was going to be able to cover up whatever I said but at least I embarrassed her enough to feel better about the situation.

Benny's truck passed me a few blocks away from my house, seeing me he pulled a U-turn and came up next to me. "What the hell are you doing?" He asked.

"Walking." I snapped back.

"Fight with Clara?" He asked knowing the answer.

"What makes people cheat?" I kept walking Benny following slowly beside me.

"Can you get in the car so we can talk normally? I look like I'm stalking you or something."

I ignored him, there was so much rage within me that I couldn't even realize that I was walking down the street with a car beside me drawing a lot of attention to us. "Clara. She's cheating on my dad."

Benny's brows knitted together in confusion. "What?"

"She's going on a date!"

"I thought she was already doing that."

"What do you mean?"

He shrugged. "Well I just assumed she was, I thought you thought so too." When I didn't answer he sighed. "But is it really cheating?"

I stopped in my tracks to face him fully. "What?"

"Well, I mean come on, your dad is gone Toni, he's been gone for months."

"They're still married!"

"Well yeah." He rubbed the back of his neck trying to pick his words carefully. "But you don't think he's coming back, if I left and never came back wouldn't you move on too?"

He was being rational, I know he was but I was so angry that I couldn't think straight. "It's cheating."

"I'm not disagreeing with you, all I'm saying is that if he's not coming back is it so wrong for her to be moving on? Can you really call it a marriage if the person leaves and never comes back,

on top of that doesn't even tell you where he is?"

"They could get divorced."

He shrugged again. "Sure, but isn't it kind of hard to notify him of that when no one knows where he is? Besides he's only been gone for a few months, don't you have to be separated for at least 3 years or something."

"What are you a divorce lawyer?" I snapped at him.

Benny sighed once again. "Please just get in the car, I'm not trying to piss you off."

Despite my angry state I did as requested and jumped into the passenger seat of his truck and he pulled away from the curb taking off down the street.

"Are we talking about your dad now?"

"What does that mean?" I asked crossing my arms.

"It means that you have barely talked about I'm since he left, Clara goes out on a date, and you've said more about him in two minutes than you have in a long time."

"I was talking about Clara."

"And how she shouldn't be cheating on your dad. I'm sorry Toni but I hate the guy, I really hate what he did to you and I just thought you felt the same."

"I do hate him for what he did." I said honestly.

"Then why do you care so much about what happens to him. As far as you know he's off with another woman and starting a new family." He regretted it the second he said it. "I'm sorry."

I didn't like to think about why my dad left, or even what he might be doing now that he was gone, and because of that I never let my mind wander. Benny was being practical that's all, he was trying to remind me of what an asshole my was.

He ignored me for years, he humiliated me, let Clara into my life, took her side over mine, never got to know me and then left without another word. I shouldn't care what he's doing but moving on from it seemed to be something harder to do than I thought.

At my silence Benny added. "I didn't mean that, I just-"

"It's fine." I told him.

"No it's not, I shouldn't be making it worse, I'm sorry."

"It's okay." I told him. "Besides not talking about it doesn't bring him back, doesn't give me answers."

Benny looked at me with the kind of expression that told me that he didn't agree with me. He wanted me to talk about it, he wanted me to express how angry and upset I was but he let the matter go anyways.

My dad was a subject that didn't come up too often, but it was always there, lingering over our heads.

He left, there was nothing else to the matter. He left and we didn't know why. There were many theories as to why he left, but the bigger thing on my mind was whether or not he was going to come back. In my opinion if he left, then he wasn't planning on coming back.

My dad had managed to ignore me for most of my life and because of that things had pretty much been like they had been when he was here. The only difference was I didn't see him come home every night and I couldn't hear him and Clara talking through the night either.

My dad was gone and it pissed me off, but the truth was, life hadn't really changed.


	22. Chapter 22

"You're not even trying!" I snapped from my spot behind the home plate fence. Benny turned and glared at me but made no nasty comment back to me, he was too frustrated to do so. "That's seven, you've struck out twice now."

"I've never struck you out twice in a row!" Kenny called from the mound.

Benny turned on him then. "Whose side are you on?"

"I didn't know I had to chose a side." Kenny replied.

I rolled my eyes. "Well you better be on my side!" I called to him. "Because I'm the one who is being realistic in this situation!"

"I'm trying!" Benny snapped at me.

"Really? Because Kenny has struck you out on four fastballs, two hang-ups and a curve ball that doesn't curve!"

"Okay now I'm officially on his side." Kenny said crossing his arms. "Let's take a break."

With a huff we all moved towards the home field dugout, after years of knowing nothing more than a bench that gave us splinters and an open concept that left us dodging foul balls every few minutes, it was odd to be in a real dugout. We sat on metal benches without equipment littering the floor, and we didn't step on wads of gum and sunflower seeds that we had to spend hours peeling from our cleats, it was different, it was nice.

"My curve ball curves." Kenny muttered taking a seat beside me.

"Yeah okay, and Phillips doesn't bobble the ball every time it's hit to him."

"You're really mean. I don't remember you being this mean." I pushed Kenny's shoulder.

"It rides too high, you need to shorten your stride."

"Should I be taking advice from someone whose arm is in a sling?" He teased, I pushed him again as he laughed. "Is it getting any better?"

I shrugged. "How the hell should I know? I haven't thrown a ball in. . . what two weeks?"

He shrugged, time had really gotten away from us, it seemed slower now that I couldn't play baseball, I spent almost all of my time helping coach both Kenny and Benny.

Kenny was easy, and usually Benny was even easier but for the last few days he hadn't been himself. He hadn't been hitting well and he wasn't performing like the superstar that he usually was, and it was weighing on him.

I had never seen Benny so frustrated before, at least with baseball. Baseball came easy to Benny, he worked at it harder then anyone else but Benny had a natural talent which made him as good as he was. I don't think he really knew how to not be good at baseball, most of all I don't think he knew how to be better at it, he was always the best.

"We've been practising for three hours I think we should just call it for today." Kenny said after a few moments.

"No." Was Benny's reply.

"Benny you need to take a break. It's just not working today." Benny didn't want to argue, and the last thing we wanted was to argue with him, especially when it came to baseball but we tended to see the bigger picture while he got tunnel vision. So with a large sigh that told us he was annoyed, he started to gather his stuff.

"I'll start picking up the balls." I said walking towards the backstop.

While I was hunched over placing balls into the bucket I had been using as a seat someone came up the the backstop.

"Hey." I looked up, the face was familiar but the hair was throwing me off. "Trying to figure out where you know me?" He asked with a smile.

I stood up swiping at the dust on my knees. "The party right?" I asked. "From the trailer park?" It was the shaggy haired kid from the party where I spit in Adam's face. His hair was shorter now, almost completely gone, he must have buzzed it off.

"Glad you remember." He looked around the ball park. "So, this is where you all spend your time. I have to say I thought they were joking about you being a coach."

"I was never really a coach." I told him. "I'm even less now."

"That the reason?" He asked pointing to my sling. "I don't remember you having that last time I saw you."

"No." I wiggled my arm in the sling. "This is just an unfortunate event, the demotion had a lot to do with spitting in Adam's face."

"Oh right!" He laughed. "I thought that was awesome."

"Yeah well. . ." I looked towards the dugout where Benny and Kenny were still packing up their equipment and had yet to notice I was talking to anyone.

"How'd it happen?"

"Huh?" He pointed to my arm again. "Oh, pitching, I threw my arm out."

"By throwing a ball?"

"You know for living in a town that seems to be obsessed with baseball, you don't seem to know too much about it."

He shrugged. "I played growing up, I just didn't stick with it, not everyone likes to spend three hours after school on the field."

"Then why are you here?"

He smiled at me. "I'm Drew."

"Nice to meet you, but you didn't answer my question."

And before he could Benny came jogging over to us. "Hey, I'm Benny."

Drew's eyes seemed to light up with some recognition. "Oh, how's it going superstar?"

Benny's eyebrows knit together. "Superstar?"

"Things get around, I was told that you're some kind of God of baseball that came out of nowhere and started embarrassing everyone."

Benny shrugged. "I just like playing ball."

"I also hear you haven't been living up to your reputation lately."

Benny stiffened and glanced at me. "Who the hell are you?"

"Hey don't worry about it, I was just leaving. See you around Toni."

After one of the more odd encounters I ever had he was gone with a wave and Benny was looking at me confused. "Who the heck was that?"

"Drew, he kind of met me at the trailer park party."

"Weird kid."

"Well we are in florida. Let's get out of here."

"We lost him." I stared at the detective, and I knew how unimpressed I looked.

"I'm not going to pretend that I know anything about police work but how did you lose him, when you never found him?" I demanded.

"We had a paper trail. . .it ended." I rolled my eyes and pushed back from the desk I had been sitting at for the past twenty minutes. "I promise we'll find him."

"I don't care if you find him!" I snapped, "I care that every few weeks you make the trip from California and bother me for an hour just to tell me nothing."

His expression softened. "Toni you don't mean that."

"I do." I snapped. "I truly mean it when I say I don't care if you find him, I don't want you even looking for him. He left for a reason, finding him is just going to confirm what I already

know!" I didn't mean to yell and I didn't mean to come off cross but I couldn't help it, I was annoyed at the fact that I was the only one accepting that my dad had left and he didn't want to be found.

I was about to go off on the poor man when the door behind me burst open and Benny entered, being quickly followed by a police officer."That's it." He said.

"Kid I told you you can't come back here." The officer said.

"Well I already am!" Benny's gaze never left me, he was angry and frustrated. "Come on." He gripped my good arm and pulled me from the seat nearly dragging me out of the room.

"You can't do that!" The officer yelled after us.

"Well I already am!" Benny repeated as we made our way through the station.

I followed him confused but I only pulled away from him once we were outside. "What the hell is wrong with you?" I demanded.

"Get in the truck." Was his response. "And don't give me any attitude about it we're going for a drive and you're going to deal with it!"

I opened my mouth to retort but quickly shut it, knowing that it probably was no use, so I followed him to the truck.

He pulled out of there faster than Ham chasing a girl through the hallways.

"What's your problem?" He finally asked once we were on the roads.

"My problem?" I demanded. "You're the one that dragged me out of there."

"Cause I was sick and tired of listening to you lie and say things you don't mean."

"What?"

"Why can't you admit that it bothers you that he's gone? Why can't you just admit that you're hurt about it? That you want to know why he left? Why can't you just talk about it?"

I was caught off guard by his anger and by his aggressiveness. "Cause it doesn't bother me."

"Bullshit! It does Toni, and it's okay that it does!"

"It doesn't." Benny glanced at me his mouth a tight line waiting for me to say something else, to change what I had said but it never came.

"Fine." He snapped taking a sharp turn and took off down a more rural road.

After ten minutes of demanding he tell me where we were going I gave up, Benny was stubborn and I was as well but when he was the one driving it didn't matter who had a stronger will.

About twenty minutes later we were traveling through a forest and Benny pulled over into a nearby field and parked truck. He turned fully towards me and pocketed the key. "Talk."

"What?"

"Talk about it."

I rolled my eyes at him. "Take me home."

"No." He said simply.

"There's nothing to talk about."

This time he rolled his eyes. "There's everything to talk about."

"Benny my dad leaving doesn't bother me."

"I don't believe you."

"I've already talked about this!"

"No you haven't. It's bothering you, I can tell. The entire time I have known you your father ignored you, I went to your house and there was never food in the fridge, you played baseball for years and he never knew about it. He didn't speak to you, to didn't stand up for you, he was never around and _that_ bothered you because he was your dad and you loved him and wanted him to be apart of your life." He took my hand in his. "He was a jerk but he was still your dad and you love him and want him to love you back. Now he's gone and I know it bothers you _because_ you love him. Why is it so hard for you to admit that this really bothers you? The same way it bothered you when he was here?"

I swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat, I had been bottling it up, I had been ignoring the fact that he was my dad and that I did miss the part of him that used to be there before my mom died, and I was highlighting all the terrible things he had done in an attempt to hate him. "People have it worse." I said. "Worse things happen."

"Yeah." He nodded softening his voice. "But this still happened, and it was still terrible. It's okay to be upset about it."

"Of course I'm upset about it Benny." I admitted. "But I can't change it. There's no point in dwelling on it."

"No there isn't, but it's only been a few months, that's not dwelling on it, that's getting over it. I just can't watch you lie to yourself, thinking that you need to be like stone all the time." He

watched me with concerned eyes and a calm smile. "I don't know what you're going through. I have two parents that love me and the only person I ever lost was Mr. Myrtle, and you lost someone not only to death but you also lost someone whose still alive. But I can be here for you, will you let me be here for you?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"Then just please tell me how you feel."

I took a deep breath and thought about all of it, from the moment my mother had passed away to the very moment I was in Benny's car, and it overcame me. It was like years and years of pushing things down came spilling to the top, I didn't even realize I was crying until Benny pulled me into his arms and wiped away my tears. He stroked my hair and there we sat for hours, I talked about how broken I felt that my dad had left and never even left a note, and how it made me feel like it was my fault. Benny assured me that it wasn't, I believed him, I told Benny how much it sucked that I didn't feel like I belonged in my own house and he told me how one day I would never have to go back.

We sat there until the sun went down, my tears of sadness turned into tears of laughter as pain turned into joy and my fears and doubts were forgotten. I felt better than I had in months and I remembered all the good I had in my life.

We ended the night by making love in the back of his truck, and then played catch under the stars and when fireworks lit up the sky we raced back to the diamond breaking almost every traffic law as we did.

Kenny was already there, as if he was waiting for us and the three of us played baseball as best we good under the light of the fireworks, laughing and remembering every summer when we felt invincible on this night.

Despite how stupid I felt for not remembering the date, I felt put together again.

It was the fourth of July.


	23. Chapter 23

"Benjamin Rodriguez The Hottest New Player." Kenny read the headline for the seventh time earning him a punch in the shoulder from Benny.

"Please put it away!" he whined pushing the paper out of Kenny's hand.

"I didn't think the school even and a paper during the summer." I said between bites of my burger.

Kenny shrugged. "They only report on hints like open houses and new athletes and updates to the school during the summer. Kind of keeps people in the loop."

"It doesn't even say anything about my baseball skills." He complained, and he was completely right, as of three days ago Benny and Kenny had officially been added to the final roster for the boys varsity baseball team. We had celebrated them making it onto the team, and now we were celebrating them being in the school paper only Benny wasn't too thrilled with what his article had to say. Across page four and five were all eighteen players for the upcoming season and Benny's article was not exactly about his baseball skills.

Kenny's headline above his picture had been _Kenneth DeNunez, throwing heat._ And had been all about how he was going to be the most terrified pitcher in the league and about how he was one pitcher that could actually hit.

Benny's didn't highlight his talents at all, it had his statistics but really the writer had subtly talked about how good looking he was.

 _The Eagles welcome a new player that not only will be helping the team win games but also getting some new spectators. Benny Rodriguez will be on the field hitting home runs and stealing hearts instead of bases. . . ._

"They're saying your good-looking how is that a bad thing?" Kenny asked.

"I don't want to be known as the team heartthrob."

"Why?"

"Well for one I'm taken." Benny snapped him and gestured across the table to where I was sitting. "And second I don't want people focusing on what I look like I want them to remember me for my baseball skills."

I put my burger down and decided to put the fire out before Benny could make it grow any more. "It doesn't matter what it says everyone knows you're an amazing player, no shame in getting attention for something else as well."

"How does this not bother you?" He asked.

"What? That people think my boyfriend is good looking? It doesn't upset me because it's true Benny. Besides I'm not worried about some college student writing a report about you, especially when its a boy."

His eyes widened. "What?"

I laughed. "Morgan Temple, is a boy I had to let him know all your names at the game he attended." Benny grabbed the paper and looked at the name written at the bottom of the article. "You need to stop focusing on what they have written about you and focus on the game Benny. You made the team but your batting has not been up to your standards lately."

He glowered at me knowing fully well that he had been struggling with his hitting, his batting average for the past games he played with this group of boys was .124, drastically different from

his .567 he was getting in the tournaments we played at the end of the year back home.

"I agree with her." Kenny said taking the paper from Benny's hands. "But I am still framing this, it's hilarious." The two of them got into a shoving match trying to push the other one out of the booth before the waitress had to demand that they settle down.

"Too bad Adam made the team." Benny said waiting for my reaction.

I sighed and agreed with him. "It might be a terrible thing to say but I was hoping he wouldn't make it either."

With Adam gone, it would have been easier to convince the coaches to give me a better task than groundskeeper, but he was staying and was a constant reminder of what I had done.

"He's an L-7 Weenie." Kenny spat biting into his burger. "Just ignore him."

"I spend every day with him."

"No you spend every day with us, he just happens to be there." Benny and I laughed at that but Kenny did have a point, if I wasn't considered a coach anymore it didn't really matter how to divided up my time with the boys. Those I didn't like I could easily avoid and Adam was at the top of the list despite how nice he had been trying to be to me.

"You know you're in here too." Kenny said flipping to the next page of the paper.

"What?" I asked. "I'm not in the article with the coaches." I pointed out.

"Nah, you're the last page, after all the players." He turned it around to show me and he was right, it didn't have my photo like all the others but my name was printed in bold. It was easy to miss considering the players articles were finished on the previous page, but in the top corner of the paper my name was there with a small blurb under it.

"What does it say?" I asked, Kenny was already reading his lips moving silently as he scanned over the writing, his lips stopped and he frowned before putting the paper down almost crushing it. "What does it say?" I asked again.

"Doesn't matter." He said.

I rolled my eyes. "Phillips used to call me everything in the book, I don't think anything they say will hurt my feelings."

Kenny shook his head and slid the paper farther away from me. "I'm not worried about them hurting your feelings." He admitted.

"Kenny what does it say?" I asked more sternly.

Knowing he wasn't going to win he opened it up and began to read. " _The Eagles are bringing in some estrogen this year and her name is Toni Sunshine Spena, although it is unclear what her role is, it is clear that she is going to be seen at the games. Without any baseball experience and a wild temper who knows what might happen on the bench and how it will affect the team this year. What were the coaches thinking? We don't know."_

I didn't know what to think, I was angry, I had spoken to Morgan and the entire time he thought I was nothing but a girl with a temper sitting on the benches.

"They're stupid." Benny said taking my hand in his. "Don't think about it."

"Still think yours is bad?" I asked raising my eyebrow. I couldn't help the rage that was leaking out into my tone of voice, I was mad. I truly was at the bottom and people were taking note, not to mention the fact that now people were going to think that I was nothing but a temperamental woman. Any anger I showed, no matter how justified, was going to be viewed as a woman with an anger problem.

This wasn't the Valley, I knew that from the moment I got here but my reputation was left back in LA and Florida didn't care who I was nor was is particularly liking me.

I looked at Benny and he seemed concerned with what Kenny had just read but was more concerned about how I was going to take it. I was mad, that was for sure but I wasn't about to give anyone who was sitting at the tables around us reading that same damn paper the satisfaction of proving the words to be true.

I sighed and leaned back in my chair and looked at Benny. "I guess we both have things to work on."


	24. Chapter 24

Clara did not cook, whether or not she knew how to or not was not really important, for as long as I had been living with Clara I had seen her cook four times and three of those times I was positive had been takeout she just reheated in the oven and one time I wasn't invited to eat with her and my dad.

As a matter of fact for as long as I could remember there was rarely any food in the kitchen and I would make meals with whatever I could find and leave notes for my dad to go grocery shopping and pretend that they were signed by Clara.

But when I walked into the house, there she was cooking away.

"Are boiling water to give the illusion that you're cooking?" I asked putting my bag down on the table.

"I thought you weren't coming home." She said turning to look at me.

"When did I say that?"

"When I told you not to come home tonight." She snapped moving to the fridge and pulling out a block of cheese.

I vaguely remembered her telling me something like that, though I tried to ignore most of what she said so I couldn't actually deny her ever saying that.

"Where exactly do you expect me to stay?" I asked.

"I don't care where you stay, have a sleep over, sleep in the park, go to the ball park I don't know! Just leave."

She didn't need to tell me why she wanted me away, she was having a man over and she was cooking for him, it was obvious, she had done the same thing when her and my dad first started dating. The kitchen was a disaster, there were overtures bottles and little traces of food scattered about, and I think she dropped a bottle of oil or something because there was towel soaking up something on the floor near the sink.

"I can't just sleep on a park bench." I said.

"You spend all day away from here, go and do whatever it is you do for a few more hours." I didn't bother telling her that the ball park was now locked and I would get in trouble with the security guard if I was found playing ball at night, the lights took up a lot of electricity and they didn't approve of my using it when we didn't have a game.

"So when can I come back?" I asked, I was too tired to fight with her, to remind her that this was my home as well and that I wasn't going anywhere but I didn't feel like being home when she was entertaining some guy.

"I said you can't!" she tried to grab something out of the pot with a pair of tongs but jumped back when the water bubbled and shot towards her. I picked up my backpack and took took off towards the door without another word.

It was only eight, and the sun hadn't even started to set yet and little kids were spending the last couple hours of daylight playing outside and running through the water that a broken fire hydrant was spewing out into the street.

Benny had dropped me off a few blocks away to make sure Clara didn't see him, I took off towards Kenny's house knowing that's probably where he went to.

I changed my mind halfway there and took off towards downtown, my stomach was grumbling and I didn't want to eat Kenny's parent's food while I was there, I would grab something quick and then use the Deli's phone to call him and tell him what happened.

Up the street a crowd had formed around something, or someone and I could hear yelling coming from the middle of it. My initial reaction was the turn and walk the other way but years playing with the sandlot boys left me walking quicker towards the crowd in order to see what was going on.

In the Valley a crowd of people usually meant on of the boys was in the middle of it, whether it be a fight, one of them doing something interesting or one of us was being embarrassed. Most of the time it was a fight.

I hadn't been expecting there to be two sandlot boys in the middle of the crowd yet again. Both Kenny and Benny were standing in the middle of the circle four other team members standing with them shouting at another group of boys on the other side.

"Hey what are the arguing about?" I asked a girl standing next to me.

"The team from Smiths Falls is here, they said something about the Eagles having a female coach."

"What?" I turned my attention back to the arguing boys and I realized that I didn't have to ask what they were arguing about, within a few seconds I could have guessed.

"What's she there for? The relieve tension after you all lose?"

"You're disgusting!" Kenny yelled at him. "You guys will say anything to avoid admitting that you lost to a team with a female coach."

"I thought she wasn't a coach?"

"She could strike anyone of you out."

"Oh I'm sure she could." One of the other team members said sarcastically. "How'd she get that sling on her arm? Throwing for the first time? _Ow I hurt my arm throwing two pitches-"_

"Even with her arm in a sling she could strike every last one of you Turkey's out!" Marcus replied to them.

I wanted to roll my eyes and curse all of them out at the same time. It was nice that the boys were defending me, even if it was only to protect themselves but it was also a story I had heard too many times.

Some ignorant boys made fun of me for playing ball or implied that I wasn't good just because I was a girl and the boys got into a fight over it. At a young age it was infuriating but now it was just annoying and juvenile, I didn't need to prove anything and neither did Benny or Kenny.

"No actually I know how she got her arm in a sling." A boy from the other team started a very vulgar hand gesture towards the boys and I saw Benny jump towards them but was held back by

Kenny and Adam.

"Shut your fucking mouth about her!"

"Oh it must be true then."

"Okay enough!" My voice travelled over the crowd and to the boys who heard me and turned in my direction. I elbowed my way through to the middle and crossed my arms, my sling had been removed and I was able to move my arm now but I was still warned not to throw for a while longer.

"Ah there she is, we mention hand jobs and she comes running!" Benny tried again to attack the boys but Kenny and Adam had a strong hold on him.

"Benny stop." I told him walking over and placing my hand on his shoulder. "Why do you care what these guys say? You guys beat them 14-3, their opinions don't mean anything."

"They shouldn't be talking crap about you."

"Nothing they have said is true." I reminded him, before turning towards the other team. "You don't have to respect me but using me as a way to insult these boys doesn't make any good arguments. Especially when your pitcher lets in eleven runs completely on his own, none of you can hit a change up and 20 out of 27 outs were strikeouts, 14 of which were strikeouts

looking."

The boys from the opposing team stared at me and it became obvious that they didn't believe that I was actually contributing something to the team and understood the game. It irked me —

knowing that the lack of respect not only involved people in town but also people who saw me at the games.

"My girl knows baseball." Benny said proudly.

I couldn't help myself. "Oh shut up Benny." I said turning around. "Look at ou guys falling into all of it. _They're trying to piss you off, why are you letting them?!_ "

It was Adam that took the bold move to respond to me. "We're not going to let them talk bad about you."

"Oh so when it embarrass' you you come to my rescue." I rolled my eyes at him. "The only people to show me any respect on this team are Kenny and Benny. Don't start acting like you actually care about what these boys say about me. You only care what it means about you."

There was a silence that stretched, long enough to make everyone thing but not so long to be awkward, I was about to remind them that I was made a coach because I knew baseball when another boy from the other team piped up."All talk no bite."

"What do you want her to do? Hit you?"

"Put your money where your mouth is sweetheart." He said, I knew who this one was he was the catcher—something Poole, a decent player but it still wasn't saying much when he was playing with the boys he was.

I saw the spark in both of the sandlot boy's eyes. "No!" I pointed my finger at them, warning them not to take the bait. "Kenny, don't."

He didn't seem to be listening. "What are you thinking?"

I rushed over to Benny's side and pulled him slightly out of earshot. "Benny stop him." But Kenny was already negotiating the stakes. "I can't throw." I hissed.

"I know." Benny said not knowing what to do or say, the only thing more embarrassing than losing to these boys would be to deny their challenge because I couldn't throw.

"She doesn't have anything to prove." Adam spoke up, much to everyones surprise, this was his chance to watch me crumble and despite his apologizes I never actually believed that he was being sincere and still held this somewhat hatred for me. "Sunshine is an amazing ball player, and honestly you guys can't hit off us, I wouldn't be so adamant in embarrassing yourself by hitting against her." I was surprised at the use of my nickname.

"Besides." Benny said. "We can't go to the field, it's closed."

"Who said we needed a field?" Poole asked. "All we need is an open area."

I decided that honesty was probably the only way for me to get out of this. "Listen, you mentioned my sling earlier, I threw my arm out." I admitted. "I can't throw, at least not up to my

standard and I'm not about to go and ruin my arm for a petty bet."

The crowd around us had started to disperse becoming bored with the conversation between the two teams. "How convenient."

The conversation seemed to end there, no one snapped a witty remark and the other team seemed to be feeling awkward standing there with the details of the bet still in the air. They couldn't

challenge anyone but me, and I wasn't giving them the rage filled reactions that they wanted, my calm explanation completely put their anger induced comments at rest.

"We'll see the rest of you assholes on the field then."

Together the team left and we were left standing there thinking about what had just happened. I was annoyed that the boys had let them get under their skin and actually let me be the reason for it.

"You guys are idiots. What were you thinking getting into a fight with them in the street? What were you going to do? Hit them? Get suspended and then not have any team in the future want

you?"

"Hey." Cole said. "We were defending you."

I rolled my eyes. "You were defending yourself. I would prefer you guys not saying anything then causing a scene in the middle of the street." Don't get me wrong, I thought it was touching that they were standing up for me, Benny wouldn't let anyone say something bad about me, and when we were younger it was heroic and kind. Now it was coming off as childish, a group of young men yelling insults back and fourth in the middle of the street was hardly attractive.

I turned my attentions back to Benny. "You know I'm a good ball player, and I have never doubted it myself. You don't need to scream at someone just because they think the same thing everyone else does."

He seemed confused. "I'm not being funny, don't you want me to defend you?"

"Yes I do, but not like this. It always seems to end the same way, you yelling back and forth until finally I'm in the middle of some childish bet. Adam was right I don't have anything to prove, and right now I can't even prove anything." I indicated to my arm. "Defend me, don't start a fight."

After about ten minutes of discussing what to do next the boys decided to go their separate ways and both Kenny and Benny started apologizing to me.

"They kind of wanted to have a dinner with just the team." Kenny said.

"I already told you, I don't care." Growing up with the sandlot boys I learned a few things. Most of those things involved how to get into and out of trouble but I also learned that I was not a boy.

Meaning there were things that they could talk about and things that they wanted to do that I couldn't. Benny and I could talk about anything but I was sure that there were certain things he needed to just talk to the boys about.

They included me in everything but I did know that there were sleepovers that they had without me because no matter how understanding their parents were, there was no chance of a girl spending the night in their bedroom, no matter how innocent we were at the time.

I understood that sometimes the boys just wanted to hang out with the boys, I didn't like the fact that they kept it from me but it didn't bother me. I technically wasn't part of the team, I was part of the staff.

Benny and I walked hand in hand and Kenny kept up the rear babbling away about how stupid the other team were to confront them. He was trying to convince me that the confrontation was all their fault but I wasn't listening to him.

I actually hadn't been paying attention to anything, suddenly I was being pulled off the sidewalk and onto the grass of someones lawn as roared to a screeching halt beside us.

"There you guys are! We've been looking everywhere for you!" I had to do a double take with what I saw leaning out the windows.

"Ham? Squints. . . what the hell?" Benny couldn't believe it. The rest of the sandlot gang were sitting trying to lean in to be seen through the windows of the truck, all mashed together in the seats.

"Did. . . did you guys drive here?" Kenny asked equally surprised to see them.

"Kenny!" The boys screamed and jumped out of the car to give each of us a hug, babbling away about everything that was happening back home.

"Wait!" I called out as Grover hugged me, the smell of cigarettes filling my nostrils. "What the hell are you guys doing here?"

"Well we called but Clara obviously didn't tell you."

Benny sighed. "What are you doing here?"

"You're not happy to see us?" Squints teased.

"I'm just surprised, now tell me why you're here!" Benny exclaimed.

"We got some celebrating to do Benny!" Ham said a bright smile on his face. "Squints asked Wendy to marry him!" Our eyes went wide. Marriage? Squints? Already?

"She said yes?" Kenny asked.

Squints sighed and threw his hands in the air. "Yes she said yes! Why is that so hard for you idiots to process?"

"Well congratulations!" I yelled out hugging him tightly.

"So you guys drove all the way down here to tell us this?" Benny asked grinning and locking his arm around Squints neck.

"Heck no!" Grover laughed. "We got a bachelor party to celebrate!"


End file.
